Hannah asked in the Ask me Anything:

I have this question which kind of follows me around since I got involved in all this medieval stuff. It is a quite common topic and I have of course discussed it with fellow fans of the Middle Ages but still I am very unsatisfied with the answers. So, here it comes: which fabrics were used for which type of garments (e.g. is it true that linen was only used for undergarments?). Or do we just not know enough about this yet?

Things are sort of in a slump here - my part of Germany is still in lockdown, with the first little bits of restriction getting loosened up. However, things feel like they did for a few weeks now, and even though time flies by in some way, I'm sort of starting to suffer under the limited input. Even though I have wonderful company in the Most Patient Husband and the little cat, and we're in the incredibly lucky situation of not having to worry about money yet, and having a garden, the lockdown does take its toll in some way.

There's no fairs, no face-to-face meetings with friends, no relaxed chatting with others in real life, no sitting having a coffee in our favourite café, no bouldering. There's also the knowledge that most of this will have to go on for a while still, and it does start to get to me by now. We're trying to make the best out of the situation, and there's nice stuff happening in the garden, there's video boardgaming, we're trying out different kinds of strength training to come back to the boulder wall as well-prepared as possible, and trying to see the good things happening as much as possible. Nevertheless, our lives have been disrupted by the lockdown for long enough now to feel annoying and tedious, more than it being a sudden crisis. Also, even with social media, telephone, and video chatting, a lot of our social life has gone into hiatus, and it does have an impact.

Theoretically, I now have lots of time to work on the to-do-list and on older projects, to finish them off, or to start new ones. I have to admit, though, that nothing spectacular has happened in that area. A chunk of my time these days is getting used to keep up on the news; there's been some more leisure time, too, since the Most Patient Husband had time off during the last two weeks, and I did prefer to join him for longer breakfasts and a nice cup of coffee in the afternoon instead of working at maximum efficiency. The latter has suffered a little anyways, from a stint of sleeping not so well combined with a bit of general meh due to the situation. I'm quite determined to remedy both problems, and there's already been good progress on the sleep part (even though the little cat has steadfastly refused to join me when I took a nap).

So. Since we're probably all stuck in similar situations, I think it might be a good idea to stir things up a bit and to give me (and hopefully you too) something else to think about. Hence I've decided it is time again to do an Ask me Anything - so please feel free to ask me stuff in the comments. Anything.* Go be creative!

I'll answer stuff in form of blog posts - a collected one, if answers are short, or single blog posts if I am getting verbose about a topic.

 
 
*In case something feels too personal, I will let you know, but knowing the readers of this blog, I do suspect that won't happen.

Doug asks

So maybe you have answered this before but I was wondering how you got involved in researching/making textiles.

I might have answered this before, but I actually can't remember - and since I have no idea on where to find the post, if such a one does exist...

It all started ages ago, when I was sweet seventeen years old. In a small village close to where I grew up, there was an annual "Ritterfest" (which is a medieval Festival thingie). One of my school comrades lived in that village, and she participated there, showing visitors how to make felt - so the next day, I dressed up in something not even vaguely historically correct and joined her, and the rest of the fun. I fell in love with the camaraderie and the bonfire evenings and hanging out and singing songs with other people around said fires that weekend. Shortly after, I started going to other, similar, events with a few people from that group... and that, of course, meant that I needed something to wear. The first piece I made for myself was a hood, by the way, and nothing I made back then was historically correct.

Fast forward about two years - time to decide what to do after school. After realising that the things I had thought about were not what I wanted to do after all, I sat down and made a list of stuff I would like to have included in my job. Things like being able to work outside, but also doing reading and desk work; maybe do something that involved other people; something practical, and something that had to do with the Middle Ages. When leafing through the Uni Guide, I stumbled across something that seemed to fit: Medieval Archaeology. And that's how I ended up in Bamberg. My parents were happy to support the choice I made, study-wise, and made it possible for me to become an archaeologist. (Thank you so much, you two!)

Back when I started my studies, going to medieval markets and similar events was still considered something a bit weird and thoroughly un-academic, much more so than these days. It was a growing trend, though, and I kept on going to these events, using them to try out garments and equipment pieces and crafts techniques. Now, however, I also had proper archaeological literature about medieval textiles, so my clothes did improve. (Over time - that was a longer process.) Textiles fascinated me more and more, and by the time I wrote my master's thesis, I was fully focused on textiles and clothing - a development I have never regretted.

And that is the full story of how I ended up researching garments and textile techniques - a teenage friend, a few lucky coincidences, some uni colleagues also interested in textiles who pointed me to books when I started out, and the opportunity to try out things and gain experience with cloth and clothing "in the wild", they all came together to make me insatiably curious to learn more about dress back then. (Hint: It hasn't lost any of its fascination on me yet.)

Thank you for asking stuff in the post from two days ago, Suzanne and Marianne!

Regarding the Schnittbücher from the Kickstarter project, the Kickstarter books are scheduled to go out in June this year (though I wouldn't be at all surprised if it took considerably longer, knowing how things go in the publishing world). Marion says that they will be available  via Amazon US and DE after the rewards have gone out - so you will be able to get your copy.

And Suzanne asks about sewing techniques in 7th century. As far as I can tell, there are about the same stitches and techniques in use as for later sewing -with the exception of things like buttonholes, which were not yet so in vogue. There's a nice overview of sewing techniques published for the Haithabu finds (later than your intended period, though) and these are not too different from the later garments. There's not so much variation to be had for a straight seam, after all: running stitch seams and overcast seams are already found in the Hallstatt material from Bronze and Iron age.
7th century Frisians are, unfortunately, not very much in my core confidence zone either, and I can't think of any books with good textile finds from that era and region off the top of my head - sorry.

I think it's time again for questions! I am pretty sure I did this before, but can't find the post anymore. So I'll make up new rules...

Ask me anything in the comments, and I will reply as well as I can. Exceptions are made if it's too personal, or if it will require in-depth research work, or involves a trade secret. Otherwise, I'll do my very best to answer your question.

So... anything you want to ask me?