As many of you know, I’ve long been interested in historical clothing of western Europe. The older, the better. I spent many years playing around with the 14th century and really got my chops down there. You can see some of the results of my work at my Medieval Tailor website.  This is the 14th century decade that I love the most, the Luttrell Psalter.

But I’ve become bored with the 14th century. I still think it is beautiful and I adore seeing it done well. I love to encourage that. But if I have to sew another kirtle right now I’m going to scream. And I just hate being bound in with tight lacing on a hot day. Or any other day for that matter. I have fun with hot flashes on a random basis and I can’t begin to tell you of my suffering on a 90 degree day in a hay field laced into a skin tight garment. With a full length slip underneath that. And long sleeves.  O.M.G.

I’ve been looking around for other periods to play with that are fun and that don’t bind me up. For several months now it’s been a tossup between 12th century French Gothic or something in the period before and during the arrival of the anglo-saxons in Britain. I even began an undertunic for the 12th century deal. The embroidery is complete, I just need to sew the garment together. And it languishes in my wooden chest.

Why? Because I simply can’t stop being drawn to wool and bone and more “primitive” materials. We know very little about clothing details in the period of about 1 A.D. – 4-600 A.D. There is very little that exists. The survival of jewelry helps us make some educated guesses but we really don’t KNOW. And that? Is a dream come true for me. Tons of room for reasonable conjecture and lots of room to play. We do know about some of the design elements in use at that time, again based on jewelry finds. But also from surviving architecure and other art pieces. A tidge from what the Romans wrote but their condescending contempt for the people they were writing about really doesn’t leave one with a vision to trust.

This just arrived in the mail from Raymond’s Quiet Press.   I have to say that the service from them was phenomenal.  I received my order in record time for this time of year.  Just a couple of days.  These are heavy pieces and his prices are incredibly reasonable.  I’ve been drooling over his stuff for a very long time.  Merry Christmas to me.

OOoh, reproduction Roman shoulder brooches.

They are called Roman because they have been dated to the time period of the Roman occupation of Britain. I intend to wear them as a woman of the Briton tribes. They speculate that her garments might have appeared similar to this.  There are also photos ofsome reproductions from bog finds in this period.  You can see them here.

I also received these pieces.

A more Celtic design of shoulder brooches, similar time period, perhaps a little later.  I see that one has a bit of a mess on one side, but that’s cool.

These are wrist clasps. They function instead of buttons at the wrist of sleeve.  On the inside wrist.  More from the later end of this long time period, more Anglo-Saxon than Romano British. But what do I care?  Not one jot.  It will do.

I’ve got the over tunic begun in a lovely navy wool.  Unlike the garment shown above, the part at the shoulder will fold over and there will be a 16″ drape both front and back from the shoulders to below the bustline.  Lots of room for plenty of yummy embroidery.  I have visions of wool/silk blend floss in green, red, gold with red horn disks and amber beads. OOoooh yummy.

Don’t ask, I stole this from the net, I didn’t mark her face.

I have the belt woven in a red/gold/brown ram’s horn pattern (not documentable to this area or period but it’s gorgeous and at least I wove it myself) .  My green shoes are perfect for the time period and will do for now.  The lighter blue linen undertunic has been cut out for months (the smaller wrists clasps are for this garment) and will get sewn while I’m on Winter vacation Dec 22 through Jan 1.    In between visits with my brother and his family. 

I only have about 2.5″ of one sock left to knit and to put together the peace banner and I’m FREEEEEEEE.

This is why I can never completely leave the SCA.  I love to do this.  I just can’t help myself.