Experimental Archaeology:

High-Necked Pleated Hemd

By Cathain Reiter

Introduction:
Upon submitting a name to the College of Heralds, it was made clear that it would be
significantly easier to document the given name Cathain as German, rather than the original Irish
the name was chosen from. Since this meant a possible change in persona, why not fully embrace
the change and make some German garb? If you are going to start somewhere, you might as well
start from the skin and work your way outward. This entry is a pair of 16th century German high-
necked pleated hemds. A hemd is the German name for an underdress or chemise. Since there
are no complete extant examples of hemds available, construction was based off of artwork. The
experience and knowledge gained from making the first hemd was used to sew a second hemd,
to try and create a more accurate garment.

Materials:
3.5 oz/yard linen
2.8 oz/yard linen
White silk sewing thread
White linen sewing thread
20/2 silk gold embroidery floss
20/2 silk black embroidery floss
Beeswax
“garnet” beads

Fabric Both the original hemd and the follow up

hemd were made out of a lightweight white linen.
There are numerous examples of shirts from the time
period being made out of linen (Arnold 65+).
Additionally, sumptuary laws of the area helped to
suggest hemds would be made of linen; while gifting
Woman from Basel Turned to the Left
a bride was highly regulated, “[Linen] chemises one
might give her to his heart’s content” (Greenfield 49). This
makes having a linen chemise or shirt seem even more
likely. For the first hemd, a 3.5oz/yard linen was used. For
the second hemd, to try and reduce bulk and have a
slightly sheer look, a more open weave 2.8oz/yard linen
was used.

Thread For embroidery on both shirts, a thicker plied silk

was used. For construction, a thin white silk was initially
used, with beeswax applied when needed. This was
assumed to be the proper material. However, upon further
research, it was observed that many linen garments, from
both German and non-German areas, tended to use a very
fine linen thread for construction. This is true of both
Portrait of Anna Meyer
fancy and plain garments. Numerous examples of this can
be seen in Patterns of Fashion 4 by Janet Arnold, pages 65 and on especially. Here, there are also
examples of shirts constructed with a mixture of fine linen and silk threads, but no items
appeared to be exclusively silk thread. Due to this fact, when the second shirt was remade, a
linen thread was used. The thread on the original shirt was not changed.

Considerations Before Construction:

There are very few extant garments from this region and period; linen often does not survive
time. There are some fabric examples, but they are often in pieces and construction can only be
guessed at. As such, art is unfortunately the main source of information available. In order to
make the hemd, several artistic renditions of shirts of these high-necked styles were investigated.
In most of the artwork, the shirts were white, with very high, full collars, which seemed to have a
ruffle at the top of the neck, and displayed pleat lines that travel from the collar down to the
bodice of the dress. These details make it obvious that the necklines contained large quantities of
fabric, very tightly pleated, to create a comparatively small collar.
Construction:
For construction of the original hemd, 3 yards of 60” wide linen were used. The entire hemd was
hand sewn and hand embroidered, using silk thread. The pattern was made to be as simple as
possible, using common historical shapes (Arnold). The hemd was made of four 30” wide
rectangular panels: one each for the front and back, and one for each arm. The 30” width was
chosen since it was half the width of modern fabric, and therefor was an economical choice.
There are 2 gores at the hips and 2 gussets in the armpits to help with fit. The sleeves and body
pieces, with a combined circumference of 120”, were pleated into the neckline to help create
fullness in the collar. While there is not an extant piece with this exact construction, scraps of a
shirt with a pleated neckline and seams on quarter lines suggest something similar, as can be
seen above (Nutz, 80). In this specific example, it seems that the sleeves were connected to a
pleated yoke, and not directly pleated into the neckline. However, a simplified version of this as
done here does not seem unreasonable. The tops of the rectangles were sewn together using
waxed silk thread with a running stitch. Seams were then flat-felled using a whip stitch. Flat
felling seams provides additional structure, and helps protect the raw edges of the fabric. Hems
were double folded with a traditional hemstitch. These are all stitch options used in period
(Museum of London 157; Malcom-Davies 50; Arnold 65+). The “front” panel was split down
the middle to reach down to about a person’s
sternum, in order to help create an opening for
getting the shirt on over the head. The bottom
of this slit was reinforced with a buttonhole
bar, and buttonhole stitches (Malcom-Davies,
p51). A similar reinforcement was found on a
shirt in Stockholm (Arnold 75).
much of the artwork showed. Adding more width to the base fabric allowed for a fuller look.
Since so much more fabric was being used in the body,
the second main change was to exclude the gores at the
hips, since they seemed un-needed. However, by
keeping the pattern pieces all the same size, the fullness
of the shirt seemed to gather in the wrong places. There
was too much fabric over the shoulders, and not enough
in the chest or back. As a result, the shirt was altered
after construction. Looking at examples of patterns of shirts from Patterns of Fashion, it seems
like most had 2:1 ratios for the body of the shirt compared to the circumference of the sleeve
(Arnold 65+). In order to more accurately match this proportion, all reachable seams were
unpicked. 10” from each side of the sleeves were moved over to the body panels. Since these 10”
sections had honeycomb embroidery sections and were significantly shorter than the body, the
embroidery was cut away, and rectangular sections of linen were added to create an even length.
The shirt was then sewn back together, this time using the linen thread as previously mentioned,
since it was the more accurate fiber. While researching thread types, it became evident that
seams and hems of the time period were significantly smaller than what had been used for this
shirt, so all seams were reduced in size to be about 1/8th of an inch, to match the standard 1/8th to
1/16th of an inch most often encountered in historical garments (Arnold 65+). The only seams or
hems that were not altered to be of both linen thread, and a smaller size, were the seams directly
in the embroidery, and the heavily pleated top neckline hem.
Pleatwork:
For the original shirt, once the tops of the rectangles were assembled, it was a tube with a 120”
circumference (and 240” for the second hemd). For both shirts, this tube was then marked out
with several rows of dots at half inch increments using a manila file template in order to be a
guide for pleating the material. This half inch pleat size was chosen since it is very close to a
size used in extant pleatwork. In the Lengberg finds, pleats averaged 1.4cm, or 0.55” (Nutz,
p84). This number was simplified slightly, which made it easier to mark out using the rulers on
hand. Once the dots were fully marked out, large basting stitches were run through each dot, and
used to gather the fabric at the neckline down to 14”. Once gathered, decorative top stitching
was done with silk thread. Gold was chosen for the
original after being inspired by a particular drawing by
Hans Holbein the Younger, in the “Portrait of Anna
Meyer” shown above on page 2. The initial intention was
to copy the embroidery, but embroidering smocking in
anything other than a straight line is rather difficult. After
much trial and error, and unpicking many stitches, a simpler geometric pattern was decided
upon. The inspiration for this pattern came from another drawing, Di Edelfrau; a close-up,
cropped version of the image is shown. Since this drawing was in black and white, the color of
the embroidery is unknown, however, gold was still used. For the embroidery, all stitches are
essentially a stem stich, which was a common way to secure pleats, both in decorative and
hidden fashions (Nutz, p82). For the wrists, a
simple honeycomb stitch was done, once again
using the gold silk thread (Wolff).
 For the second shirt, an embroidery pattern that could be
better documented was chosen. This pattern was heavily
based on an extant example of pleatwork at the Museum
of London. In this example, the embroidery is done in silk
and silver on wool, on what is thought to be a sleeve. The
embroidery on this fragment is pattern darning (counting
pleats instead of threads), which makes it especially
fitting for a hemd. The pattern is sewn in long stitches
across the neckline, from one side to the other, and slowly
grows as each line is added. Since the height of the
neckline to be
embroidered was
greater in size than
the sleeve in the extant piece, the pattern was doubled in
order to take up more space. Additionally, only one color
of silk was used instead of a mixture of silk and silver
thread. While the extant piece was not done in black,
black was chosen for its stark contrast against the white
(Black embroidery is far from unheard of). It seems that
the thread chosen for this project was significantly finer
than in the extant piece though, leading to a more delicate
pattern. Stem stitches were used to further secure the
pleats, done on the reverse side, using the same white silk
thread that was used for the rest of construction.

Once the embroidery was completed, both shirts had a strip of linen sewn on the inside of the
collar and cuffs in order to help hold the desired size of the pleating. Every individual pleat has a
stitch going through it to properly hold it in place. This was once again done using whip stitches
with waxed silk thread. The guide threads for the pleating were removed before the linen strips
were fully sewn down. During reconstruction of the second shirt, the linen strips backing the
honeycomb smocking on the sleeves were removed so as to be able to redistribute the sleeve
fabric. When these strips were reattached, linen thread was used instead of the silk.
Di Edelfrau
 Closure:
Something that was not previously
mentioned is how to get the shirt on and off.
Many of the images do not show a clear
opening. However, some of them, such as
the Portrait of Anna Meyer previously
referenced, seem to show a slash in the front
of the neckline, which is then held closed in
some fashion. This neckline is held together
in some invisible fashion, possibly by a
hook and eye opening. While a hidden clasp
could have been chosen for construction of
the hemds, buttons were used on both shirts
simply for look of them. Buttons that are
small in size and made of a material that
resembles garnet were chosen. A recent
German find at Kempten shows the
fragments of a decorated collar neckline
with a button loop on it (Rast-Eicher p328),
so buttoned necklines were around in this
time and place. “Medieval embroideries
were often… enriched by the addition of
pearls and other precious and semi-precious
stones… or glass beads” (Staniland 46), so
even
Margarethe though
von Aiche; there Bruyn
by Barthel are no extant examples
of a neck closure specifically like the ones
done for this project, it is not entirely implausible. One can find multiple portraits from various
countries showing small beads or pearls (usually white) for neck closures, including a German
portrait in the Museum of Fine Arts, shown to the right. Using a “garnet” bead as a button
follows a similar theme, and still fits in with German aesthetic.
 Final Thoughts:
As previously mentioned, twice as
much fabric was used in the second
shirt as in the original, in order to
increase the fullness and to create a
denser pleat. This increased the
circumference from 120” to 240”.
The second shirt has much more
volume, allowing the vertical folds
and pleats to more accurately
resemble the artwork, especially after some of the additional fabric was moved from the
shoulders to the front and back panels. The additional material also allowed for the number of
pleats to be doubled in the neckline. This removed the tension on the embroidery pattern that can
be seen on the original hemd through the way the pleats pull on each other in some of the more
open areas of the design. The change in embroidery styles also helped by providing more “give”
to the pattern, and took away many of the larger open spaces.

While the 3.5 oz linen was fairly easy to work with, unfortunately the 2.8 oz/yard fabric was
difficult in several ways, due to its very open weave. It was not nearly as crisp in appearance,
and didn’t hold creases as well. Additionally, it was very hard to mark the fabric when creating
the grid for smocking. The marking pen
used would constantly just go through
the fabric, leaving little to no ink on the
threads. As a result, dot size had to be
over-exaggerated. Once everything was
marked out and the long running stitches
used for gathering the fabric were
started, it was found that the weave was
very easily distorted. The warp and weft
threads could be moved from their place
with very little effort, creating a run or
pull. Instead of picking up only 2 or 3 threads like normal, several more threads needed to be
picked up with multiple threads in both the warp and weft directions, so that the fabric was not
being destroyed. Both issues (marking and gathering) lead to the pleating process taking much
longer than previously, and gathering ended up less even than with the slightly heavier linen. In
an effort to correct this, the sleeves on the second shirt were gathered in a different manner than
the neckline. Previously, dots were marked off every half inch, and then threads were picked up
at each dot to create gathers, with the gathering thread at the top of the pleat. For the sleeves,
ruler tape was laid down, and the thread was passed through the fabric every quarter of an inch,
which resulted in pleats of the same size, but with the gathering thread in the middle of the pleat.
This change distorted the fabric less, and removed the marking issue, however, it is not practical
for the neckline due to the shear amount of tape that would have been needed.

Even with the difficulties experienced with the second shirt, it was
still worth making (and re-making). The changes in thread type,
hem and seam size, amount of material used, and body proportion
changes all made positive impacts on the overall outcome of the
shirt. The only change that really was not advantageous was the
change in the fabric itself, since it created more bulk and weight
than expected, due to the body of the weave. It is interesting to see
how small changes can affect the look and construction of a
garment, for better or worse.

References/Works Cited:

Arnold, Janet. Patterns of Fashion 4: The Cut and Construction of Linen Shirts, smocks,
neckwear, headwear, and accessories for men and women c1540-1660, Macmillan, 2008

Bruyn the Elder, Barthel Margarethe von Aich c1540; Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
Crowfoot, Elisabeth; Pritchard, Frances; and Staniland, Kay. Textiles and Clothing 1150-1450
Boydell Press, 2006

Greenfield, Kent Roberts. Sumptuary Law of Nürnberg; a Study in Paternal Government. Thesis.
John Hopikins University, 1915. https://archive.org/details/sumptuarylawofn00gree

Hans Holbein the Younger, Die Edelfrau Woodcut Passavant, no. 34, State i; Rosenwald
Collection 1964.8.1092 National Gallery of Art https://www.nga.gov/collection/art-object-
page.48242.html

Hans Holbein the Younger Portrait of Anna Meyer c. 1526; black and coloured chalks, 39.1 x
27.5 cm (Kupferstichkabinett, Öffentliche Kunstsammlung, Basel)

Hans Holbein the Younger, Woman from Basel Turned to the Left, c. 1523

Malcolm-Davies, Jane and Mikhaila, Ninya The Tudor Tailor: Reconstructing 16th Century Dress
Costume and Fashion Press, 2006

Museum of London, Texitiles and Clothing: Medieval finds from Excavations in London
Board of Governors of the Museum of London, 1992

Museum of London, Sleeve Fragment ID: A26865

https://collections.museumoflondon.org.uk/online/object/90816.html?
fbclid=IwAR1IR4IE9UtG7KiwWFK8qvEKf_3pNxZOlc5f2xWmOzGQGbkzR3Y20ixec1o

Nutz, Beatrice. “How to Pleat a Shirt in the 15th Century” Archeological Textiles Review Issue
54, 2012 p79-91

Rast-Eicher, Antoinette and Tidow, Klaus; Mühlberg-Ensemble: Die Textilien

Staniland, Kay. Medieval Craftsmen Embroiderers. Buffalo, University of Toronto Press, 1991
Willett, C and Cunnington, Phillis. The History of Underclothes Dover Publications 1992

Wolff, Colette. The Art of Manipulating Fabric Krause Publications 1996