Margaret in a large ruff and white cap.
Hello, everyone. If you’ve been reading this site for a while, then you will notice that I’m a new face. My name is Margaret, or Bridget Walker in the SCA, and I’m very excited that Karinne invited me to join her on a site I’ve read and admired for years.
I joined the SCA in the early ’90s in a fit of Irish enthusiasm. My early efforts were generally generic Celtic or English, with some, shall we say, creative choices. I got more serious about costuming in the early 2000s and slid into the Low Countries as a “Flemish Market Girl” by way of Drea in Leed’s work on the Elizabethan Costume Page. From there I started dressing like a woman from one of Pieter Breughel’s paintings, which served me very well through three pregnancies. Finally, I returned to the market genre paintings, this time looking at the buyers, rather than the sellers.
Currently, I’ve been exploring the genre paintings and the formal portraiture from the 1560s up until about 1620, when the fashionable silhouette changes. Most of my work focuses on the one thing that really makes the clothing of the Low Countries stand out: the headdresses. Karinne and I met through the Facebook Elizabethan Costuming group entirely due to our mutual enthusiasm for the huik. I have also been experimenting with the little starched veils and caps that go under the huik and are seen in very good detail in the portraits.
Margaret in a pot-lid huik.
I’ve put the handouts for the classes I have taught in the SCA in our “teach” section. One of them is a general overview class on all of the wonderful variety in Flemish head gear. The other class is focused on how to make and starch a linen cap, as well as how to dress the hair to go under it. Both classes included a lot of hands-on examples, so neither handout is meant to stand alone. My next few posts will expand on them. I’ve also added a gallery where you can see some of my previous projects. I hope you enjoy them.
Excellent ! Love your outfits ! The change in style in the 1580s then again in the 1610s and 1620s is tough to decipher. As you know it starts off looking very Spanish, and is borrowed from Spain, but then becomes the Dutch Vlieger. Which is a style copied in central Europe also. There is an extant bodice – the one worn under the black robe – found in the “Darmstadt” German Museum Collection. It is pinkish with black feather like cut velvet. This black robe and bodice is found in colonial NY inventories.
Thank you so much, Tara! I agree that pinpointing exactly when some of these changes took place is a bit difficult. In general the line seems to be from dress, to doublet with loose gown, to the bodice worn with the open fronted loose gown with sleeves. Of course, figuring out exactly what you’re looking at is not at all helped by the Dutch penchant for black.
I had to laugh, with the penchant for black comment. I think I strained my eyes looking at paintings until I finally started turning up outfits done in detail and on lighter background…relief ! There is extant in European museums. Which have helped me a lot. I have not made an outfit yet, but am writing an article…slowly writing an article. Hence my interest. When making Dutch outfits the one nice thing is that most people in the low lands were middle class just over 60%. I read that the lowest paid person – the milkmaid – was still paid more in the Low Lands than she would of working in any other western nation at that time. So, even she could have nice woolens. It makes the century a bit more “romantic” in hind sight.
Again, love your outfits !
Yes, artists like Hendrick Goltzius are a godsend. I have also found that sometimes even the muddiest of paintings posted on the Internet will yield surprising amounts of detail if you lighten them with photoshop. Please let us know when you publish your article.