Easy SCA Garb

Someone once wrote, either on rec.org.sca or the Fidonet MEDIEVAL Echo, "Is there anyone out there with a simple pattern for a tunic and maybe some pants?" That inspired me to write down how I make tunics and pants. Later I added a simple dress pattern, based on the bliaut pattern taught to me by Etienne des Nuages.

As far as I know, these are not typical of any one particular time and/or place, but they can be done with almost no sewing skill, make a final product that looks at least generally medievalish, and can be easily adapted in many ways (pleats, tapers, slits, ties, trim, dags, linings, different materials and colors, etc.) to fit into a wide variety of general looks.

General basic sewing tips:

• Before you do anything else with the cloth, wash it, separately from anything of other colors (if your cloth has any color). This will drastically reduce bleeding and shrinking in further washing. (Of course, I ass-u-me that your cloth is washable! If you're making garb out of unwashable fabric, you're probably far beyond needing this info anyway.)

• If you don't have access to a sewing machine and don't know even one basic stitch, it will suffice to poke the needle down through the fabric about half an inch in front of where it came up the last time, go backward about an eighth of an inch, and poke it back up again, in sort of a "two steps forward, one step back" pattern. Unfortunately, this stitch looks rather ugly on the "forward" side, so only use it where that won't be visible. If both sides of the stitching will be visible, there are plenty of others you can use.

  Since this gives you three passes at all points, you can get away with using thinner thread, or with using only one thread instead of doubling it as is usually done for hand-sewing (but of course you'll have to be very careful not to de-thread your needle).

• Pre-hemming all edges will help avoid fraying. Use at least a simple fold, possibly even a rolled hem (i.e., folded twice). However, this will make all seams much stiffer. Whether that is good or bad is up to you.

• It is strongly advised, though not absolutely necessary, that you hem all remaining raw edges. It looks better and prevents fraying.

• Because of the two factors above, you should make each piece of cloth wider and/or longer by however much your hems will take up.

• You may make most of these out of two colors (for tunic, use one for the body and the other for the sleeves); that is perfectly good for many periods/places, and less boring than one color. I don't know about three. Be aware, tho, that sewing different weights or kinds of cloth together by machine can be tricky.

• There are of course much more advanced but still very basic techniques, that I will not go into here. If you're curious, buy/borrow/whatever a book on basic sewing and look up "facing", and how to do other good hems, such as rolled, and maybe even more fray-resistant seams.

Items you can make easily (more possibly coming later):

• Easy Dress
• Easy Great Kilt
• Easy Pants
• Easy Tunic