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Hollywood vs Medieval Costume

It's rather hard to find out facts about 'real' medieval costume. Of course there are costumebooks which deal with the Middle Ages, but most of these mainly contain the dress of the nobility or rich upper classes and hardly ever give patterns or descriptions how to make medieval costume. Or of what kinds of cloth or in what colours. Most people nowadays think that people then wore mostly velvets with lots of gold braid, lace collars, pointy hats, knee-pants or tights, shiny silk capes, heavily ornamented swords and berets with ostrich feathers. It's a pity that this view does not correspond at all with what people really wore. We, however, do know what costume between 500 and 1500 looked like (and how it differed from the period coming after 1500). And we do not only know what the nobility wore, but also how the common man or woman was dressed during this whole period of 1000 years and even up to ca 1700 and back to Roman times.

We've been studying costume since 1990 now, mainly form the original sources, and have made about every item of dress ourselves and tested them by wearing them in daily life. This experience gave us precious knowledge about cut, sewing, cloth and use of this type of historical costume. Our knowledge is therefore quite unique everywhere.

Of course we don't rent out costumes; this would be too cumbersome. But we can advise you on how the different medieval garments really looked like for all layers of society, how they were made, from which cloth and colour and how they were worn and in which combinations, down to the smallest detail, including accessories. We can design your costume(s) for every occasion. We also advise on non-authentic medieval costume. If, for instance, you would want designs for the stage or screen, we could give you advise how to obtain the look, without having to go the whole way into authenticity and with the exaggerations neccesary for, especially, the stage, be it plays or opera.

Mail us if you want to ask us about whatever type of costume you want or want to know about.

For patterns of medieval clothing, to make your own, see the Patronenpagina (only in Dutch, I'm afraid).