What Medieval Women Wore in Winter (14th Century)

I was recently in Norway for some medieval shenanigans and on one of the days it was minus 21 degrees celsius and I was wearing medieval clothing throughout the entire week that I was there. I wanted to put my 14th century clothing to the test and see just how effective it was in very low temperatures and even when it was snowing. There isn't a ton of opportunities that I have to do this so I thought this was the perfect chance. I was at the family cabin of one of my friends with some of our other friends and we all do reenactment and I thought it was the perfect opportunity to show you all the various layers of what medieval women wore in the winter in the 14th century. During the early 14th century up until the mid 19th century many parts of Europe were facing what is now called the little ice age so even though temperatures can be quite cold in Norway even now they were likely even colder in the 1300s due to this phenomena. Therefore it's certain that people needed warm clothing during the middle ages. So I did actually film these garments when I was in Norway and outdoors even when it was snowing but for the first layers my camera was just not in focus and I hadn't noticed. Even after years of working as a filmmaker these types of things still sometimes happen to me so it just goes to show. So I'm showing the first couple of layers instead in my studio so that way you can see what they look like in focus and then I'll travel magically to Norway for the other layers. Additionally for every garment that I show I'm going to explain and then show on screen a sketch of what it looked like flat patterned. That way you can all get a not to scale reference of what the garment pieces maybe would have looked like before I sewed them up into a three-dimensional shape. Again these are not to scale so don't take them exactly as they are but just use them as kind of a general inspiration. In fact that's how I self-drafted my own garments with the help of a book called The Medieval Tailor's Assistant which I highly recommend. They give you some shapes and then they tell you how to plug in your own measurements and then you can draft your own patterns. It's really cool. The very first layer I'm wearing on my body is a medieval smock that I hand stitched from a fairly lightweight wool. It isn't the lightest wool that I've ever worked with but it isn't quite as heavy as the wool I'd maybe use to make a coat from. As in the dress in medieval period, c-o-t-e coat, not like an outer modern coat. The reason I chose wool for this garment is because a linen smock like many of the ones that I have and I wear in my everyday life actually can make you even colder in such extreme temperatures. That's why it's ideal to wear a wool layer so that your body can stay as insulated as possible. I'm super used to wearing even very rough wool directly against my skin and it doesn't bother me so I'm able to withstand this but for anyone with wool sensitivity this would not be a very pleasant first layer. I also don't know of any direct historical evidence of people in Norway during the late medieval period wearing wool smocks but it's just something that felt logical to me because linen is not a good insulating material and it can actually make you a lot colder when you wear it as your base layer and people in the past were so intelligent that I'm sure they figure this out too. For the pattern it's two big rectangulars that I attached triangular side gores into and I had a very limited amount of fabric so I had to sew a shoulder seam but normally I would just cut the shoulders on the fold so that way it wouldn't be needed and then I cut a neck hole so that way I can actually get into the garment. The sleeves are somewhat like this, very elongated trapezoids that taper in slowly as you move closer to the wrists and I also attached them to square underarm gussets for added arm movement. As I mentioned at the start when I filmed this wintry medieval getting dressed video I was spending some time with my reenactment friends in a cabin in Norway and I asked my friend Mats if he wanted to also show what might have been worn by males during the late medieval period. I typically only show my own clothing on this channel and I dress in feminine styles primarily so I felt it would be a nice way to educate about masculine styles. That second video won't be out on YouTube for three more weeks but it is already available over on Nebula if you'd like to watch it early. I became a creator on Nebula back in September of this prior year and Nebula is the sponsor of this video. 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And now let's keep learning about what medieval women wore in winter. So under the wool smock I'm wearing two pairs of hoes. The first is made of a rust red wool cut on the bias and I draped some mock-up fabric around my legs and then created a leg piece in this general shape. And then I did the same around my foot to create a foot piece with the seam underneath the foot. Some people don't like to make their hoes in this way and prefer them to be more formed and rounded but I really like to wear my hoes like this. Then on top of that I'm actually wearing a pair of hoes that I knitted. There is some evidence for knitting in the middle ages but in Scandinavia where I typically reenact knitted hoes are not usually approved at reenactments due to the fact that there isn't evidence for knitting in Scandinavia in the 14th century. In order to be more accurate here now bound socks for extra warmth would maybe be more likely however I don't do now binding so I'm wearing my knitted ones. I secure these to my legs with garters just under my knee and I'm wearing a pair of leather turn shoes based off of a find from Dorjekt. In order to keep my feet warmer and even more dry I'm also wearing some wooden patterns over top. These are more 15th century in style as I don't own a 14th century pair but they serve the same purpose. I would like to buy or make a 14th century pair in the near future as I find them very aesthetically pleasing as well but I just haven't gotten around to it. The patterns were a little difficult to walk with in the snow at times because the snow would pack into them underneath and also where my foot was it would get icy and kind of concreted into there which would mean that they could sometimes slip off. This mainly happened to me when I was hiking in rather deep snow where snowshoes or even medieval skis probably would have been a much more sensible option. But my feet still stayed somewhat comfortable and also relatively dry and I think keeping my feet warm and dry was probably the most difficult part about wearing medieval clothing in these conditions. But other than my feet sometimes being cold I was feeling really warm and comfortable outside overall. The next layer is the coat and I hand-stitched this one from a rusty orange wool. If you saw my getting dressed as a medieval woman in the 14th century video the non-winter edition then you might remember this one. It's a very loose and long coat and then I wear it with a tablet woven belt. It can also be paired up with a leather belt like this style that I had in my other video which I believe is based off of a London find. I pull up the dress over the belt so that it bags over and this helps to make the hem an easier length for walking or for a physical lifestyle which the majority of medieval women had. Contrary to common belief women have worked since the beginning of humanity and not just in roles at home but also in hard labor jobs. Many women in fact would have had hard labor jobs and then they would have gone home as well and raised their kids working two or more full-time jobs. This isn't about medieval women but if you want to read more about women's work in early history or prehistory then I highly recommend Elizabeth Whelan Barber's book Women's Work The First 20,000 Years. It is such a fascinating read and it has taught me a lot about prehistoric textiles and the importance of women's work in prehistory. The coat is patterned quite similarly to the smock that I made with two giant rectangles for the front and back pieces however I cut these on the fold at the shoulders so that way it ended up being one very long rectangle and then I cut a slit at the center front and back and inserted a triangular gore for both. I also attached triangular gores into the side seams for even more drape and space in the garment and I cut a head hole finally at the neckline and I set in some sleeves. These ones are drafted in a similar elongated trapezoid shape as well except they have a little bit of a curve where it gets more narrow. So this is where the layering really continues. On top of the coat I hand-stitched a new surcoat. This one I made the body from a very heavyweight laudanwool and laudanwool is such an amazing material because it's extremely durable and water resistant. After weaving it gets fold which makes the cloth quite dense and because of this it's extremely warm while still remaining durable. I wanted a fabric that was more flexible for the sleeves as laudanwool can sometimes be a bit stiff due to how heavyweight it is so for the sleeves I used a different wool. This one is more of a broad cloth and I tried to choose a color as similar to the laudanwool as possible that way you couldn't really tell that they were different. I drafted the pattern for this garment myself and it is in this type of shape. I cut it out with the center front on the fold and the sleeves have a curved head since the arm's eye is also curved for the garment and I only stitched them up from the top of the shoulder over to the back of the body and then stopping around where they meet the armpit and this makes the sleeves detachable that way if I get too hot and need to remove a layer I can slip my arms out of the sleeves and get a bunch of extra airflow going and this really cools you down. When I've shown this detachable sleeve surcoat in the past people have asked if there's actually historical evidence for this garment or where does it come from and this is the main manuscript from the 1250s that I've seen that the style comes from however I believe there are other sources as well where you can see this but this style is all over this 1250s manuscript and you see it quite often appearing. The pattern for the sleeve looks something like this and the way I made it was actually just by dressing my dress form with one of my surcoats and then using some scrap fabric to draw out a sleeve head and then I cleaned up the lines when that pattern was flat. My best friend Devin hemmed this garment for me because I was panic sewing it right before this trip. On my head I'm also wearing a coif and semi-circle veil over top. The veil I'm wearing here is silk which would have been extremely expensive and upper class so something you likely would have seen worn more often by everyday people in this type of climate would be a veil made of fine wool instead. I just didn't have one so I figured silk was a little better than linen for overall warmth. In my other 14th century medieval fashion video I show how I typically will wrap my veil along with how I attach a wimple when I wear one so if you're curious about how that's done that video will show you the process. Then Devin very kindly drafted for me and sewed most of this lovely hood using some leftover wool fabric from some of my medieval pieces. She started making it right before our trip to Norway and then I finished stitching perhaps the last one-third of the garment right before I actually needed to wear it once we were already in Norway so we both have imbued our love and our hard work into it. The pattern for this is essentially one big rectangle that then has a center front and back gore set into it for shaping. I also will roll the front of the hood to get the shaping to be a bit tighter around my head and I think it looks super cute and the design is incredibly simple. And finally as a last layer if I'm feeling especially cold Devin very kindly sewed me this cloak as a gift and it is made with two layers of wool so it's even I think reversible and it uses a piece of lucet cord at the neck for the closure which Devin also made and the pattern for this is just a big semi-circle with some space for the neck. So this is basically what I wear in winter if it's medieval clothing this is all around the 14th century and it's just a lot of wool basically and I actually feel very warm the only thing that doesn't feel very warm is my feet and my fingertips so something to mitigate that is for my fingertips I could wear closed gnarled bound gloves I have a pair over here I'll show you. My friend gifted me these for my birthday and they're all closed at the fingertips as you can see so that's nicer for keeping your fingers cozy and warm except it's not very good for operating camera gear so that's why opted for the fingerless ones that Mats made me. Well this is the whole look and if you go over to Nebula right now you'll be able to see a version for menswear it's already up there and in that version I show what my really dear friend Mats wears for his medieval clothing in the winter time because he has a beautiful kit that he's made himself and put together and so I want you all to see that in the different components. Thank you so much for watching this video and if you have any questions about my kit I'll try and answer them in the comments down below just leave them there and I'll see you all in a couple of weeks for that other video showing the medieval menswear in winter.