The Making of the Peacock Vest…

When I visited Chicago in 2018, one of the architectural elements that inspired me the most was the Peacock Doors at an elegant hotel called The Palmer House.

The Palmer House was built in 1871 but destroyed in the Chicago Fire two weeks after it opened; it was rebuilt in 1873 and then again in 1926. C.D. Peacock Jeweler – the first business to incorporate in Chicago in 1834 – would set up shop in the Palmer House in 1927. Its doors were designed by Louis Tiffany, who produced three sets in cast bronze, weighing in at half a ton each and valued at over $1M. At the time of my visit, the store was still there under the Kay’s Jewelers brand.

When I returned home, I tried to squeeze the design onto one of my hats, but it wasn’t a large enough canvas to do the design justice. So when I stopped making hats in 2023 and began work on a clothing line, it proved to be the vehicle I needed to bring this design to life.

I chose a Model T Duster pattern as the base garment. Fitting the pattern pieces to my dress form allowed me to determine that although I had thought to add additional gores in front and back in order to make a fuller skirt, it really only needed one additional gore at the center back. I also decided to make this garment as a sleeveless tunic-length vest.

My stash of recycled textiles yielded a lovely blue herringbone wool for the body, and a rust colored suede cloth for the peacock which would replicate the bronze color of the Tiffany doors. I made several photocopies of the photos I had taken of the Tiffany doors, and played with them on my drawing board before transferring them to the dress form, where I ultimately revised their posture so they would be asymmetrical.

Since the design was complex and I didn’t plan to line the garment, I worked the peacocks on navy tulle so I could applique them to the vest as single pieces with minimal embroidery on the body of the garment. I traced the design from the photocopy onto tissue paper, which acted as a stabilizer to the tulle. The photos below show me using a window as a light-box for this tracing. I braided yarn to lay as the tail feather spines and connector pieces, which acted as guides for positioning the suede cloth ‘feathers’.

I soon discovered that I would need to do a lot more embroidery than I had planned. I added metal studs to the tail feathers after abandoning the colored and bezeled jewels I had collected for this project. I also ended up working the body and tail as separate pieces, which ended up giving me greater leeway in placing these peacocks on the vest. For the body (and with the help of a certain ShopCat), I painted a piece of tatted lace from a wedding gown that a friend had donated. The body would prove to be more fragile and time consuming and than the entire tail.

Having run out of paint, I decided to dye the rest of the lace for the gores. But my test pieces in rust colored dye, came out maroon! A navy dye worked better; it was a good color match to the wool, and the gores would be more subtle and less of a distraction from the overall design. Another modification occurred when I tried to shape the front closure, and found the wool shaped itself naturally around the curve of the peacock’s head and neck. That was a very happy accident. (Not shown here is the hook closure behind the peacock’s head.)

In spite of my best efforts to avoid lining this garment, I ended up doing so in the areas where the applique had required the most intensive anchoring. I had just enough of a coat-weight satin to line the vest from neck to waist, and the front panels. I finished the seams around the lace gores with a rust and silver ribbon, and added a single pocket to the right side so it lays under the overflap.

After approximately 300 hours of work over the span of 2 years, I am happy with the results. The front hangs smooth and straight, while the back flows over my bustle.

This garment has been crowd tested and works equally well on all genders, as modeled below by three of my colleagues (from left to right): Kasey Cruz, Nigel Quinn and Alinne Oliviera.

I am now thinking about repeating this peacock on a shorter jacket, but in black leather on grey herringbone (a Goth Peacock!). If you are interested in purchasing this piece or the next one, please feel free to contact me. (Blouse and bustle are for modeling purposes only and are not included).