Middle Ages

I’m always delighted and relieved when people actually make comments. Thanks, Colin and John, for pointing out that the “Dark Ages” are less so than they first seemed, and that the Church had an active interest in keeping bodies draped. John also noted that tailoring and court fashions truly changed the tenor of dress. I’ve wondered in return if this was an early example of human nature and its craving for interesting dress trumping the religious morality of the times...

With fashion firmly established during the Middle Ages, what can be said about the creation of fashionable styles? Clothing styles that had previously existed for long periods, even decades, now began to change on a more rapid basis. Sometimes fashions manifested themselves as changes to specific garments, and the houppelande became a ready palette for such stylistic change.

By definition, the houppelande was a long, full-skirted gown with a high collar. Worn by both sexes, it was a staple garment from the 14th through 16th centuries. The way that the upper classes and nobility wore the houppelande, however, dramatically demonstrates the effects of fashion, as we see in this wonderful illustration from the time of Richard II of England. The taste for exaggerated sleeves and shoes with turned up points, known as poulaine, marked the wearer as a privileged person – someone who definitely didn’t need to do manual labor. Royalty and their noble-born followers were so intent on preserving the ability to make fashions unique to themselves, they failed to notice how quickly the lower classes were able to ape their betters. And so we see an early example of the power of fashion at work within an unequal society.

Once they did take notice, the upper classes discarded their fashions with practiced ease, moving on to the next enthusiasm in dress. The invention of tailoring in the 14th century not only aided the development of court fashion and military uniforms, it also offered more practical garment adjustments. The fashion cycle was spinning more frequently, in a continuing quest to renew itself as something fresh and ready to be envied and admired. In other words, becoming more like what we’re familiar with, eh?

The transition to the Middle Ages, or the Medieval era, occurred when information—including fashion changes—became better spread by trade and travel. Royal courts exchanged information (and spies) on what rivals were doing and wearing. Monarchs and court favorites were studied for their fashion innovations, in a manner quite similar to the recent media scrutiny of Hilary Clinton’s South Sea pearls during her confirmation hearing. The upper classes dressed to impress and their inferiors scrambled to imitate them when they could. Class status was preserved when better dress could be denied to those of lower class status, giving rise to sumptuary laws for clothing and textiles that only begged to be broken.

The nobility considered themselves the arbiters of fashion, while increasingly finding themselves threatened by the growing merchant and middle classes. Almost as soon as nobles ventured out of their castles in the latest fashions, wealthy merchants’ sons were spurred to copy their dress. Imitators included those in the affluent middle class whose goal was upward social mobility. Even transvestism now had a place in creating mobility between the sexes. Isn’t it fascinating to realize that these patterns of social mimicry became prevalent in the Medieval era, long before the time of Jay Gatsby?

p.s. Although I may be wrapped up in the past right now, I’m still mindful of what day today is. January 20, 2009. Inauguration Day. Have you been following the spate of stories and articles in the media about how the fashion industry is looking to Michelle Obama for salvation? C’mon, get a grip! Instead of looking to one woman, however wonderful and stylish she may be, why doesn’t the fashion business look to what really is the problem? Wretched designs, that’s what! Lose those baby dolls and shrunken scale jackets. We’ll all spend money again if there’s actually something to buy out there!