Underwhere, under there!

Most people realize that, when buying clothes, you need to wear the appropriate undergarments.  For a t-shirt, a regular bra is fine; a ballgown requires specialized underthings.  This is true for historic clothes as well.  That's why we start an outfit from the inside-out.

As mentioned before, the gamurra doesn't require a corset, but it does require a chemise.  This is know as the camica in Italian; in other parts of the world it was called a smock or chemise.  In the Renaissance, and all times before the advent of washing machines and dry-cleaning, these were generally light colored and plain linen.  In addition to protecting the body from potentially itchy fabrics and annoying seams, they also protected the outer clothing from the body.  Have you ever washed a floor-length gown by hand?  Back in the day, that was the only option.  Rich folks might have enough smocks to change daily or more often, and of course the poor had fewer.  Linen was as common in its day as cotton is in ours and was the preferred fabric.

I purchased some handkerchief weight linen locally and washed and dried it on high two times before cutting, so that it would get any shrinking out of its system.  So far it's going together nicely- the directions in the aforementioned pattern are pretty straightforward and easy to follow and it's all rectangles.  I'm doing French seams, because that is how I roll with mah undies.