
Hood, 2011
Hood was an essential 14th century accessory. It's both warm
and very cute. After having worn my friend Hanna's (also known as
Joanne Pekantytär in SCA) hood I decided to make one of my own for
the next event.
I copied the pattern from Hanna's hood. The cape was a bit tight
for me at the shoulders so I added gores on the sides.
I found a mauve wool blend from my stash. I had originally planned
to make a coat of it but as the coat had not materialised yet I
decided it was high time to use it for something else. It also
looked very pretty with my light blue kirtle. I also found a small
piece of wine colored wool which would be just enough for
decoration.
I considered lining the hood with the same mauve wool blend, but
then I found a beautiful, wonderfuly soft cream colored cashmere
wool. It was of course costly, and it felt kinda silly to hide the
most luxorious material of the garment in the lining, but then
again it would make the hood warmer than the loosely wowen mauve
blend.
I sewed the seams by machine and bag lined the front edges of the
cape. On the edges of the hood and cape I basted the top material
and lining together as they would be covered by the decorative
edging. The shoulder gores I had added had changed the shape of
the cape slightly, so I had to shorten it a bit at the shoulders
so it would not look too heavy.

I decided to decorate the hood with a leaf-shaped border, very
fashionable at the period. I marked the shape of the edge on a
doubled strip of wool with chalk, stitched the pattern with short
machine stitch and then trimmed away the extra material very
closely. Or course the period method would have been to either
just cut the edge to shape or finish it with blanket stitch. For
the first option the wool was too loosely wowen while the second
was more time consuming than I was prepared to give for this
project. The finishing I used looks okay anyway since the machine
stitching doesn't show much on the dark colored fluffy wool, time
will show how it will take wear. I can always take it off if it
begins to ravel too much.
The leafs are far from even, as the chalk wouldn't stay very well
on the fluffy surface, but it doesn't show that much either unless
you take a very close look. The decoration on the end of the
liripe is quite off, but I didn't have energy at the moment to do
it again. This was one of my less perfectionistic, relaxing
projects.
I shaped the right side of the upper edge of the leaf border and
simply turned under the wrong side. Sewing the shaped edge was
surprisingly fast since the stitches dissappeared so well on the
fluffy surface, so I didn't have to make them very small and neat.
I edged the front edge of the hood with similarly shaped border.

I made the buttonholes
with cream colored silk thread, this time using just blanked
stitch which was faster to make than buttonhole stitch. I made
cloth buttons of the remains of the wine colored wool. The
hood was small enough to be carried in a bag, so apart from
the few machine sewn seams it was another nice public
transport / coffee break project.
The hood turned out very cute and warm, a nice, practical
garment that is wonderful on chilly evenings.

Since making this I
read my Thursfield more thoroughly and learned that this style
of hoods were mainly worn by men, while women wore smaller
hoods open at the front. Nevertheless I like this hood so much
that I'm going to continue using it anyway.
Special thanks for Hanna for the pattern!