I like big voluminous skirts (and I cannot lie). *cough*
Sorry...
To be quite sincere, however, one of the things I love most about historical fashion is the variety of silhouettes and shapes which came in and out of style. Skirts, sleeves, bodices, and especially bums were are all molded, shaped and padded to achieve the day's most fashionable look. But in the 18th century when it came to butts and hips, the general rule was bigger is always better.
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| A selection of great contemporary cartoons. |
Ladies layered up pocket hoops, false rumps, and petticoats in different combinations to create the desired shapes, which, lucky for us, created excellent material for contemporary satirical artists, and provides us with great information. The ladies over at Demode Couture tried out many of the shapes you can see in these sources and shared the results! Such a wonderful piece of work by these ladies, so I followed their lead when choosing the 2 shapes I ultimately went for.
I wanted false rumps which would be able to be worn with several different gowns, over a large amount of time. Rump shapes changed quite a lot over the century, but I thought the two I chose gave me quite a lot of options.
The Continental Shelf
I affectionately call this rump "the continental shelf," because it really emphasizes the hips (especially on my body), with quite a sharp drop off. It is more properly called a bum roll, or sometimes and Elizabethan bum roll. I really like the shapes this gives. It is almost like mini-panniers, and I could see amping up the shapes to emphasizes this even more, which you can see in some of the sources above. This silhouette works well for middle-ish decades (1730-1770) and for middling and working classes - a la Outlander. It is not a luxurious shape, or too extreme (comparative to some of the fashionable door busting shapes of time).
To make this false rump, I used some scrap linen I had in my stash and stuffed it with fabric scraps (a good cheap and historically accurate solution). I like that the weight of the fabric scraps helped the roll to sink into my natural shape - you can see it dip down at my center back. I think this gives it a much more natural look and maintains a bit of my bodies proportions. You can see in the bottom left photo how well this roll emphasizes my hips and gives the illusion of a much narrower waist.
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| The "Continental Shelf" in action |
The Big Booty Bump
This false rump simultaneously gives a bigger and softer silhouette, that is all about the booty. I thought the hip parts would be too extreme but they really help with the proportions and softness of the silhouette. I was really worried when I made this that is was just going to be comically large, but it turns out that size is perfect! This shape is softer, and better suited to the later decades (maybe 1770-1790ish). Again it is not so extreme that it cannot be worn by middling classes, but there is something a bit more sumptuous and provocative about this silhouette.
I made this rump out of scrap cotton I had in my stash, and used some pillow batting to stuff it (not HA but it did the trick), and used the American Duchess Simplicity Pattern. I didn't use scrap fabric to stuff this one because the amount needed would have made it very heavy. Large rumps like this could have been stuffed with cork shavings, sawdust, wool, or possibly a combination.
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| The Booty Bumper in action |
Resources
Demode Couture - These ladies tried so many shapes!
The Importance of Skirt Supports with American Duchess
Tutorial on "Continental Shelf" Style Bumroll - Elizabethan Costumes
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