Women's clothing in the 1300s

In 1300 tailoring was born, it goes without saying that the clothes began to be more designed on the body and abandoned the appearance of huge and shapeless shirts. The birth of fashion can be traced back to this period, from here on, in Europe, clothing began to change quickly adapting to the times and following the evolution of society.

 Medieval women's clothing from this period was made up of layers.

A linen or hemp shirt (materials widely used for clothing in contact with the skin and sheets.) Called "chemise" was used as underwear.

The socks were mostly white and knee-length.

A tunic was worn over the chemise which could have various shapes, it was called "cotte" or "kirtle", it was normally long to the feet, with very long sleeves that cover most of the hand. Those tunics were made of wool, another material widely used especially for outer clothing.

On top of the surplice another tunic was worn that may or may not have sleeves. Outdoors they wore very long cloaks with wide and hanging sleeves, often hemmed or padded with mink, rabbit or cat fur(!). The sleeves of high-ranking women were often decorated and embroidered with precious motifs.

The shoes were mostly pointed.

The headdress at that time could have been a band of cloth (linen or silk) stopped over the head and passing under the chin and a veil on the head or a cap to complete everything.

To contain the hair was used a hair net called "crespine", which also became a precious ornament because it was made in jewelry. Strangely, uncovered hair was accepted in the Italian states and decorated with ribbons, bows and flowers and collected in braids that adorned the head.

As already mentioned, the most used fabrics were hemp and linen, wool for outer clothing such as tunics and cloaks but for nobility there was also silk and velvet and from Italy came the expensive brocade decorated with repeated motifs and animals.

Obviously the Middle Ages is a very long historical period. Here I wanted to summarize the uses of the period from 1300 until the beginning of 1400 when something began to change radically.

In this context is the historical woman of whom we will talk at the end of this month, I will also introduce a new doll inspired by her, there will be several surprises, if you want to have some advances and participate in some way in the creation of this project, subscribe to my newsletter that is coming this week.