For discussion: Your favorite periods

[holyschist]

Some questions for discussion this week (and may influence which resource posts get started first):

1. If you have a persona or other reenactment focus, what period and place is that?

2. What is/are your favorite periods/places for clothing?

3. What period/place would you like to learn more about for clothing?

4. Are there any post-1600 areas of dress you're interested in as well?

Comments

[holyschist]

Well, flat-chested was fashionable. The boobs-on-a-platter look is mostly a modernism. Even quite large-busted women in 16th century portraits generally don't show cleavage. This is what I look like in a doublet gown over a boned back-lacing kirtle:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/rosettastones/3523341034/

What I found for me was that a front-lacing, un-boned canvas-stiffened kirtle lifts what little I have just enough to give me a slight high bustline that creates a period silhouette under other clothing. I'm still nearly flat, but I like the look a bit better.

In generally, I've found front-lacing and less boning gives me more of a bust. But I also suspect that through the 16th century, except possibly in the highest class, heavily boned pairs of bodies or kirtles weren't common, and that the smooth cone look was achieved by layers of dresses (early Tudor women, for example, seem to be wearing at least three layers over the smock on their torsos, and probably more layers of skirts). This is all quite heavy and not always suited to modern climates, but it's amazing what multiple layers, some stiffened with canvas, will do to smooth things out. And working and middle-class portraits pretty widely show bodies that doesn't appear to be boned, and fewer layers--Italian, English, Low Countries, and Spanish--you see bust curves and wrinkling in all of them.

Anyway that should probably be a top-level post on this community

It should! I really want to do serious drag at events, not just obvious-girl-wearing-boy-clothes, and I've been wondering about binding options, particularly ones that would be comfortable enough for camping.

Leaving that out is leavingn out half of what made the medieval world.

It is, and see: SCA allergy to religion. I believe the rules are that you can hold religious services in your campsite, but nothing quasiofficial--so a site chapel would be out. I'm not sure. Perhaps it might be worth poking through Corpora?

And I think that there aren't the same appropriation issues around Christianity that there are around other cultures, since it is so dominant, as long as it's approached with respect, and nobody's doing things like actually mocking the Sacraments.

It's not so much appropriation--I agree--just not something I'm comfortable with because I'm never quite sure how much I do respect religion on a fundamental level. I just feel weird about playing spiritual dress up. But that's me, obvs, and I don't know how other people feel about it.