Esme Rose

Ah!  The month of May.  Breathe in deeply the scents of the earth, as flowers begin to bloom and brighten all around us.  When I think about what May means to me, it's a frolic of feet in the grass, baby animals being born, little birds with fledgling wings leaving their nests.  And a time to garden.  A time to plant.  A time to plant the vegetable garden, and a time to plant flowers that will bloom sweetly in the warm summer months ahead.  Its roses.  Roses for Mother's Day.  Roses made of icing for wedding cakes.  Roses for their beauty and heady scent!

Early on, I knew when May rolled around, I'd want to make Esme a rose garment.  This tiny doll has become such a part enjoying each season through sewing.

Roses have a long and colorful history.  They have been symbols of love, beauty, war and politics.  According to fossil evidence, the rose is 35 million years old.  There 

are somewhere around 150 different species of the genus, Rosa, spread throughout the northern hemisphere from Alaska to Mexico, including northern Mexico.  Garden cultivation of roses began some 5,000 years ago, and most likely started in China.  During the Roman period, roses were grown extensively in the Middle East.  The petals were used as confetti at celebrations, for medicinal purposes, and a source of perfume.  Roman nobility established large public rose gardens in the south of Rome.  After the fall of the Roman Empire, the popularity of roses seemed to rise and fall depending on gardening trends of the time.

During the fifteenth century, the rose was used a as symbol for the factions fighting to control England.  The white rose symbolized York, and the red rose symbolized Lancaster.  As a result, the conflict became known as the War of the Roses.

Roses were in such high demand in the seventeenth century, 

that royalty considered roses or rose water as legal tender, and they were often used as barter and for payments.  Napolean's wife, Josephine, established an extensive collection of roses at Chateau Malmaison, an estate seven miles west of Paris in the 1800s.  This garden became the setting for Pierre Joseph Redoute's work as a botanical illustrator.  In 1824 he completed his watercolor collection, Les Rose, which is still considered one of the finest collections of botanical illustration around.

Roses aren't the easiest to plant to grow and tending them takes a time and dedication many don't have.  And they do have thorns.  Yet we love roses so much that they decorate confections like wedding cakes, tea sets, bedding, perfume bottles, curtains, clothing, and just about anything useful and decorative.  

One of my early introductions to roses was my grandmother's rock garden, where she grew flowers of every kind.  I'd go out there on hot summer days and make flower fairies from a rose, a twig, and 

a blade of grass tied around the twig for arms.  Luckily, my grandmother didn't mind me destroying her beautifully bloomed roses, and rosebuds for the fairy's head.  We also snacked on sugared rose petals that were sent to us from a confectionary in New Orleans, although the sugared violets were my favorites.  When tea rooms were launched around the country in the 90s, people once again discovered the novelty of sugared flower petals.

Esme's little rose costume took some time and study to create.  I had a vision in my mind, but executing it took some research and effort.  What was initially targeted as a simple rose costume, became a study in form and patience.  Do I ever do anything the easy way?  No.  My intent was to create something that looked as close to a real rose, but in wool felt and garment form.  Needle felting one would have been a lot easier.  Making roses from felt isn't too difficult if you use the rolled method, and I have done this plenty for hats for my dolls.  When I think about it, I've made plenty of tiny ones for Alice costumes.  Dressing a doll in petals took a departure from this.

I found several petal patterns online and chose the one that seemed best to fit my needs.  I was going to "cheat" and use the green boots from the holly costume, but they didn't look right.  

The most important thing to me was how to bend the wool to represent the petals' natural curling shape on its edges.  I sewed "veins" in the petals.  When you look at illustrations of roses, they seldom show the anatomy of the rose, but moreover the soft beauty of them.  When I made the sunflower petals, they naturally curled from the stitching.  This didn't occur in the wide shaped petals of the rose.  Ironing the curls didn't work either.  So, I ended up making a basting stitch to pull the edge of petal to make it curl.  How much effort was I going to put into this anyway?  I could have tried soaking them in starch and forming them on something to dry in shape.  Then they would have been stiff and most likely would have ruined the nature of the wool felt.  So, I kept studying images of roses and realized that some petals do have a bit more of a ruffly edge.  I can justify any outcome with enough effort!

In these two photographs, you can see how I planned the petals for the bonnet and the skirt.  I took them to use as visuals when I went to actually sew the pieces together.  I think it's fun to see the "how" of things and not just the results.

And since Maggie Iacono's dolls are made from wool felt, they made great pin cushions!  Well, you can pin things on the doll and not harm her.

I made leaves in the same manner of the rose petals and even considered making the leaves of the rose hip, but when that time came, it was too much.  She is a tiny doll.  Please see the anatomy of a rose illustration below for the names of the parts of the flower.  

The bonnet was fun to make.  In fact, it was a bonnet similar to this on a Madame Alexander Shamrock doll, that inspired this whole project.  Since Esme has such a tiny head, seating a petal hat/top on her head is problematic.  Creating a tiny bonnet to sew petals to did the trick.

The last "cheat" I attempted, was that of the panties.  I was going to use the panties from the sunflower costume, then decided that the bottoms should be more like the central "bud" of the rose.  So, I whipped up a pair of pink ones.  And, finally, made some cuffed booties from the green of the leaves.  

I hope Esme Rose inspires you to go out and buy some lovely roses for your home.  Even one in a bud vase can bring a spot of cheer in a small place.  We don't grow roses because my husband doesn't like anything with thorns.  I wonder why he married me?!  Hahahahaha!

I hope you'll enjoy the sampling of "eye candy" with roses that I acquired and selected for this journaling.  And thanks to Heather Cullman for reminding me of the term "eye candy".  And do try some sugared rose petals sometime.  Place one on your tongue and simply enjoy. 

Love, Melissa