Parti dresses

JACOB CLAESZ - Portrait of a girl with a carnation, 1520-24

Today, the charity sewing club that I'm in went to the Puyallup Sewing and Stitchey Expo. We were there for about 3.5 hours and needed every bit of that time to see all of the vendors that were there. I came out with 1.75 yards of a gold brocade remnant fabric that was calling to me, a modern dress pattern, and an assorted bag of 50 zippers.

While I was standing at a table of books and drooling over some of them, parti-colored medieval clothing came up. My friend mentioned that she'd like to see some of the examples available in artwork. When I got home this evening I pulled up a couple of examples available on the Internet. I got ready to send them to her, but then thought of this blog. Parti-colored clothing would be a great post for here, so I set about working on this post.

So, how much did I know about parti-colored clothing when I started writing this?

Hmm...well, next to nothing. I knew parti-colored garments and accessories are commonly worn by people in the SCA. I had even seen a few examples in artwork, like the ones I pulled up. 

That means parti-colored garments are documented, peer-reviewed, and peer-supported. So, that's enough on that subject, right?

No, I want to dig into the little and not so little details. For me there is never 'enough' when it comes to medieval history. But I guess that's just my passion speaking. Makes me question my choice of college studies...

Anyhow, for anyone that wants to know, Here is some information on parti-colored garments, backed up by art. I will write my own research on this someday.

SIMONE MARTINI - Detail from 'Scenes from the life of St Martin',  St. Martin is Knighted, 1312-17