To hood or not to hood?

[mem001]

Hi there.

I've just made my first reenactment clothing for my wife and me. We've joined a group that covers 1250 - 1350, and I've gone for late 13th century kirtles and surcoats, so loose rather than fitted, no buttons or lacing, all wool. This is hers, waiting to be fitted for sleeve length. The belt I wove on my post loom, using tablets.

The question I've got is that I've got lots of material left over, so I'm working out what else I could make. Catherine feels the cold, so I was going to make her a cloak or hood, but looking through manuscripts I can't quite decide what would be appropriate. Our status is middle-class, so not fancy and not impoverished.

On Pinterest I see lots of Viking hoods and later, London hoods, but nothing inbetween. I have found a few sources of women wearing hoods from this period, thanks to this page http://www.larsdatter.com/hoods.htm.
There's a cowl hood on a woman gathering corn in the Maciejowski Bible http://www.themorgan.org/collection/crusader-bible/34
and there are high class women wearing open hoods http://digi.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/cpg848/0380
and working women wearing them in the Lutrell Psalter http://www.bl.uk/manuscripts/Viewer.aspx?ref=add_ms_42130_f163v

I think a cowl would keep Catherine warmer than an open hood ...
Any thoughts would be welcome.

[Neil of Ormsheim]

Hoods are good. I have two I use regularly - a light weight (linen, wool silk mix) for warm weather (factor 5 million sunscreen!) and an all wool one for cooler weather. I would strongly recommend hoods.

[guthrie]

Definitely a hood. With a very small liripipe. That's almost all you see people wearing, apart from sometimes female head wrappings. It doesn't look like hoods were lined at that time either, or at least by the 1320's or so you sometimes see different colours inside the hood than outside, but not earlier.

[Alice the Huswyf]

From experience on my first event with all the time and £ spent on the rest of the family, I didn't have enough layers at our first event. A hood makes an astounding difference to body heat, as did having sleeves long enough to cover the base of my hand. Period correct, thermally practical - because they knew what they were dealing with.

Kepp her sleeves as long as you can - IN fact, I never used to cut sleeves or hems short - I put on a good wide turnback or hem, so that they could be let down if things shrank/ it kept skirts weighted/it kept repair cloth to hand and at the same level or 'worn'.

You could make a HOODLESS cloak (mantle) , but they are cumbersome to wear if you are active - and we all make our first ones too long and end up sitting round the fire in a soggy-hemmed woollen dew-catcher, which then just makes extra condensation int he tent overnight as you try to dry it out. If you do have spare cloth, consider making her a second cyclas/ sleeveless overgown so she can double-layer. It happened. Plus, although made up, the fabric is reserved in large pieces, so it can be cannibalised later for other garments. Which also happened - re-cycling is an ancient art.