Dress Houpelande for a Companion to the House

Although my persona is 10th century viking, my Household that I am in the process of trying to join, is 15th century german. So if we show us as a household in dress, it's ALL the Houpelande's and Dags and shiny boots (If you're a guy). As a female fighting household member (when and if I make it that far) the uniform is less clear, but it's still very much 15th century. As a companion to the house (I have expressed interest in joining, but the house hasn't expressed interest in me yet. a sort of pre probationary period lasting at least 6 months) I wear a black tabard when I fight. For full dress, it's a bit complicated. If I was a guy, I would make myself a nicer black tabard and still wear the tabard. As a female, it looks dumb, and it's not appropriate for any period to wear a tabard belted over my clothes. With Fall crown tourney coming up, and several of the guys in the house throwing their hats in the ring (two of them with a good chance of winning) All of us coming to cheer have been requested to show up in full house formal dress. I decided that me in my viking undergown with my tabard belted over it and my bare feet LIKELY wasn't what they had in mind, although it's the strictest interpretation of the rules. But the rules were designed for male garb, not female. I decided, after consultation with the other fighting female household member, to wear a female houpeland in unrelieved black (like my tabard) this provides a nice continuity of look between the male house members and the female, while still maintaining distinct gender for those who wish to.

both figures here wear houplandes
Boccaccio "Livre des cleres et Noble Femmes"
ca 1404 

It's really a very simple garment; almost exactly the same as the male version. Other than a few deviations in collar style, the only obvious difference between the two garments is that,  while the men's came in numerous lengths (from just past the crotch to floor length), Women's Houpelande were limited to floor length (or super exorbitantly long so you had to carry it.) It's one of the few times in history that I can think of where male and female clothing were almost exactly the same, which is interesting (excepting the way back when when people basically wore tunics and long tunics.)

As previously mentioned, there are several variations of the neckline for the women's Houpelande, Since the idea is a uniform look (pardon the pun), we chose the high neck to match the style that the men wear. Likewise you can do almost anything with the dags: we chose the crenelated style used by the men's current dress garment.

There is, as usual, argument about the best way to create this garment. A lot of the plausible research suggests for the very opulent style: essentially a full circle of fabric with a neck hole and slits cut for setting the sleeves. This produces an incredible garment, but is also a LOT of fabric. It also doesn't entirely provide for the very fitted drop shoulder look seen in a number of the illustrations I perused. I didn't fall too far down that rabbit hole.  I wanted a garment that would look and hang like the period garment, not necessarily an exact reproduction. In some cases, the two are the same thing: you can't get the period look and hang without the proper construction. in my case I thought i could probably manage by drafting off a block.

church of santa maria, piano italy.

Another source of debate is the lining of the gown. While it seems obvious from even a quick perusal of period images that the gowns were lined fully (every turned back hem shows a different color) I have seen it asserted that they were exclusively lined in fur. While there are certainly a large number of them lined in fur, probably even the majority, there are plenty of illustrations that show a non furry lining. I will not be lining with fur, because many times when I will have occasion to wear this it may be 90 degrees outside, and i do not wish to melt.

Life of the virgin, the birth of Mary, detail
ca 1470

Houpelande's were an over gown. they were worn over the fitted kirtle of the 14th century (indeed they were fashionable over the end of the 14th century and the beginning of the 15th.) Frequently the undergown was made of some sort of fabulously opulent material, which would then show at cuffs and hem. It's also possible that it could have been fitted with a wide trim around the hem of the fabulous material and pin on sleeves. Certainly a short sleeved kirtle with pin on sleeves was known. Later images, particularly several by van der weyden show this short sleeved gown appearing next to a woman in a houpeland, possibly as it's own sort of overgown,  while some other images seem to show it as a sort of undress. My own kirtle has pinned sleeves and may later be outfitted with a contrast hem. this is easy and practical for me, providing more combinations of outfits with less effort. Although I cannot assert that it is absolutely correct without much more research, I feel like I can call it plausible.
 (If you wish to go further down this rabbit hole than I did, a quick google search for "women's 15th century houpelande illumination" will yield many hours of fun.)

For my own recreation, I started from my recently drafted body block, dropped the shoulder, and slashed and spread it from just above the bust point.

The first fitting was promising, but needed a few further alterations. There was more fullness than I wanted under the arm, so I re-adjusted some of my spreading. Also there was a problem with the sleeve. I had placed the seams at the center top and bottom of the seam, rather than at the front as in my husband's hanging sleeve. and made the shortest part of the sleeve also parallel with the shoulder point. That turned out to not work out as well in practice. The short part of the sleeve ended up being at the back of the wrist, and an awkward fold over the hand. I moved the seam to the front of the arm, as in my husband's hanging sleeve, and moved the short part of the sleeve to match. This solved that particular problem.

The obviously problem with this patterning method is that it makes a pattern piece wider than the fabric. This is only a problem to the modern sensibility though. In period, many fabrics were woven on much narrower looms than our modern machine looms, so fabric was frequently seamed together before being cut out. I just did the same here. Laid it out, added a piece where it was needed, then cut. Then I laid the cut piece out on the lining, and cut that out.




I made the sleeves as a unit first, since they had the dags and I wanted to get them out of the way. I used my patented cheater dag technique to save fabric and make sturdier joins. Which meant first making a whole pile of dags....








and then catching them in the seam between sleeve and lining, turning, pressing, and top stitching. Oh my sleeves!

Although it seems most likely that the original garments (particularly the fur lined ones) were sack lined, I ended up flat lining my gown, because the outer fabric was too drapey for the pattern. The flat lining gave it some support. I pad stitched the collar to a piece of felt, and sewed that in, and then attached the sleeves. The final step was to have my long suffering mother pin the hem (and it was a vast amount of pinning) and help me get it cut straight. Which was a challenge with the slithery fabric. I would like to take this moment to state that this is why I'm becoming a natural and period fibers snob. linen or light weight wool would have been SO much easier to work with (I didn't have a bolt of either of them lying around though.) Finally I installed a very wide hem facing of a nondescript grey "faux wool" I had lying about, to protect the white lining from dirt.

I had a little fabric left over and a lot of curiosity about the full circle method of construction, so I made Kitten a tiny black houpelande with fur lined sleeves using that method. It turned out well, but, as I suspected, it doesn't have the snugness across the back and in the shoulders that you see in some of the illuminations. I suspect that were I working with a full fur lining, I would prefer this method. Kitten's has a fur lined sleeve, and the upper chest is lined with medium weight wool for warmth.

Over all, I count it a success. I ended up using one of my viking under gowns with pinned on sleeves. Hopefully I will be able to upgrade that to a proper undergown with a contrast hem before I wear the Houpelande again. I ended up having to adjust the sleeve cap after I had already made the sleeves, so the sleeves are JUST long enough with the dags. I will lengthen them a little in the next iteration of the gown. It was comfortable, classic, and I was able to layer enough to be warm (and think I can layer down enough to be moderately cool as well)

With the hat and veil added to it, I Really felt like I looked like I had stepped out of an illumination, which was fun.