The Essential Apron

An apron is possibly the single most useful item of clothing your can acquire.  You've gone to a lot of time and expense to create a period correct garment, you will need to protect it from dirt and damage.  

There are numerous uses for the apron besides the obvious use of protecting your skirt when cooking, candle making, tending the wounded, etc.  You can lay it on the ground to sit on.  Drape it over farb items you need to hide.  It will cinch in the waist of your skirt if your weight drops, and hide the gap in your gown if your weight increases.  (Darn that periodic bloating!)   Wear it to disguise accidental rips in your gown until you can mend them.   You can grasp the apron hem and raise it to create a nice, big "pocket" to haul items in.  It is a handy towel for wiping your hands or the kids faces on.  

I always wear an apron unless I'm doing something "genteel" for which I need to look respectable.  Be sure your apron has a big roomy pocket-this is very handy to carry needful items in.

Aprons were usually very full to fit over and protect as much of the skirt as possible.  Some aprons had a bib to protect the front of the bodice.  I am told that apron bibs did not usually have shoulder or neck straps--the bib attached to the bodice with straight pins. Period magazines, however, have patterns for aprons that covered the bodice with a "pinafore" type of bib attached.

Women of the Civil War era were very frugal, and recycling fabrics was an art form.  They made aprons out of flour sacks, old blankets, & old dresses.  Even nice hostess aprons were made simply, so they could be laundered more easily. 

Construct your aprons from muslin, thrift shop cotton sheets, or fabrics leftover from other projects.  Or take the easy way out and create:

Fannie's $1-1 hour Apron

I got this idea from our frugal ancestors, who would recycle shabby old skirts into aprons.

Materials:  One thrift shop skirt.  

Scour the skirt section of your local thrift shop - look first for garments made of period correct fabrics (cotton, wool, linen), then for a garment with a nice, full skirt.  Get one with a back zipper.  If you are really lucky the garment will already have pockets in it!

Sewing Instructions  

1. Cut the skirt up both sides of the back seam, discarding the seam and zipper. 

2. Cut strips up each side of the former back seam, 4 inches wide (these sections will be the ties for your apron).  

3. Cut off the waistband from these strips, turn under the edges on the long sides and sew.  Set aside

4. Turn under the raw edges on the back of the skirt and sew.

5. Attach the ties to each end of the waistband and sew securely.

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Image at top of page courtesy of Library of Congress, image below Fanny & Vera collection, project scribbles by Fanny