Mandy Barrington

My research into the relationship of the body to clothing has directly informed the development of a new and unique pattern drafting system that directly links the measurements of the intended wearer to a new historical pattern. The pattern instructions follow a numerical sequence to draft a basic block pattern onto which the new pattern is then plotted. This is an ongoing piece of research that has resulted in a publication in 2015 and a second volume that was published in 2018.

My book goes a step beyond traditional historical costuming texts by not only providing the reader with historical pattern diagrams and information, but by showing you how to adapt these patterns to the contemporary body shape. Each pattern has been generated from an original stay, corset, or pattern taken from historical garments, and the instructions to follow these new patterns are designed to accommodate any size of female figure, allowing you to avoid extremely difficult, time consuming, and inaccurate resizing.

Further research into historical undergarments such as the farthingale, hoops, crinolines and bustles is the focus of a new publication on foundation garments. The book is firmly based on the methods of pattern drafting used in my book Stays and Corsets, with clear step by step instructions that follow a numerical sequence to plot the new pattern. This will be published in 2024 by Routledge.