Cap of St. Birgitta

As I said in my previous post, last month I took a Pennsic University class on how to make a St. Birgitta's cap. Lady Sarai Tindall taught the class. I don't think she has a website of her own, but the method she taught was very similar to the one in this tutorial. The main difference was that Lady Sarai had us leave the ends unconnected to each other, so that we could tie them in a knot or bow. Also, we didn't do the optional embroidery between the two halves of the cap, and we had to "finger-press" the linen seams instead of ironing them (fortunately, in hot and humid weather, that isn't difficult to do).

You can go to the tutorial if you want step-by-step instructions. I would just like to post photos depicting some of the stages of my work.

First, here's how my cap looked toward the end of the two-hour Pennsic class:

I had hand-stitched the two halves of the cap together and finished the gathers at the back of the head, but that's about it. (Granted, a good part of the class was an introductory talk followed by distribution of materials, etc.)

The next time I bothered to take a photo of my work, I had pretty much finished sewing the ties to the front edge of the cap, down to the gathers. The ties came in three separate pieces, including a bit of extra handkerchief linen I had to buy after the class.

I finished the last little bit of stitching only after I got home from Pennsic. Here are a couple of photos of the finished cap on my head (pardon the mundane clothing on the rest of me):

I'm not sure about that bow. Maybe I should redo the strap/tie as a long closed loop that could be wrapped around my head. Hey, I should experiment with this -- what a concept!

I think I have enough of the handkerchief linen to make at least one more of these caps.I might try the same thing, or I might experiment with doing the embroidery down the middle seam, or other embellishments such as contrasting thread for the hand stitching. We shall see.

In the meantime, I'll leave you with a few other links related to the St. Birgitta's cap.

http://www.pinterest.com/miriampike/accessories-cap-of-st-birgitta/
http://m-silkwork.blogspot.com/2008/11/womens-caps.html
http://katafalk.wordpress.com/2014/04/21/embroidered-st-birgittas-cap/
http://katafalk.wordpress.com/2014/01/16/st-birgittas-cap/
http://m-silkwork.blogspot.com/2008/08/cap-of-st-birgitta-reconstructions.html
http://larsdatter.com/birgitta-caps.htm