Sewing Tutorial:
14th and 15th Century Medieval London Buttoned Hood

What a medieval hood looks like.

A proper 14th century medieval hood usually has triangle gores on the shoulders and a groovy, long liripipe hanging down the back.

This is a fairly easy hood to put together. It only has 4 seams if you cut the liripipe out joined. You may save fabric by cutting it out by itself and sewing it on.

If you line this hood in another colour, it has 10 seams- 4 seams each and two to join! It can have buttons down the front or be worn open like the picture in the manuscript.

 

	Step 1. You need: fabric, scissors, pattern (pretty sure you can get this from online or I have a very basic one you can modify on the easy hood tutorial page) and pins. Right. Let's get started! Lie your fabric flat and open like the picture.
	Step 2. Now fold your fabric horizontally like this from the top. If you are a beginner or want less sewing, you will place the top of your hood to go right across the top fold. If you're not or you are using limited fabric, piece it however you like. You can sew your liripipe as part of this, or separately.
	Step 3. Last minute fabric fold check! Here's a side picture of the folded fabric to make sure you've folded the right way. Now we are ready to start.
	Step 4. Position your hood pattern along the top fold of the fabric and pin! pin! pin! If you have a really limited amount of fabric, the dangly liripipe at the back can be cut out separately and sewn on later. Okay, now cut out your hood! Yes, the face opening looks really long, but it's often folded back. Your triangle gore fits in the slit you can see coming up from the bottom. It looks like this.
	Step 5 Cut the hood out and remove the excess fabric. The line running vertically up where the shoulder goes is almost as long as the sides if the triangle gore, but not quite. The exact length will depend on your pattern.
	Step 6 If you DID cut the dangly liripipe separately, now is the time to unfold your hood, measure half way down the back of the hood and sew the dangly liripipe on so it looks like this. You will have one triangle gore for each side.
	Step 7 Position your two pointy triangle gores so the top of the triangle goes into the top of the cut in the fabric. Double check you have your fabric the right way out as fabric usually has a right side and a wrong side. Okay, pin pin pin!
	Step 8 When you sew your triangle gore in, start at the top of the triangle and do one side first. Then the other side. If you just sew up and back in one hit, you might end up with a chunky bit at the top of the gore. If you are hand-stitching, you will definitely want to stitch your fabric down one side at a time, especially if you're using wool and medieval sewing techniques.
	Step 9 Right! Now you have your triangle gores sewn in, it's time to join the two sides of the hood together. Make sure your good side of the fabric is on the inside and you are sewing the wrong side of the fabric. Sew along the red line. It's usually easier to sew upwards because if things aren't lining up properly, you'll be adjusting the liripipe and that's easier than adjusting the bottom bit.
	Step 10 Now you're down the buttonholes and buttons. Remember, buttonholess go horizontally at the very edge of the fabric and they should be about 2cm or an inch apart. You will probably have somewhere about 14 buttonholes. To make the buttons, you just need some cloth scraps from the hood and the MAKING BUTTONS TUTORIAL. The tutorial will show you how to make your own buttons. Remember, your buttons go at the very edge of the fabric, not in from the side like we do today.
	The finished product! Here is my hand-stitched, 14th century wool hood. It's lined which you can't see here, and has 13 buttonholes and buttons. The side shoulder gores look a little wrinkly in this photo but when I'm wearing it, it smoothes out over the shoulders. This was a medium-weight wool twill in a herringbone stripe. I hand-dyed the outer and left the inner a nautral wool colour. Happy sewing!

Notes on lining the hood.

If you want to line this hood, do that before you add buttonholes. To do that, just cut and make two identical hoods and sew them together.

Remember the good sides go together when you are sewing so when you turn them inside out, the good fabric is on the outside where you want it.

Sew the two together starting at face opening and sewing all the way around leaving a little opening to flip the hood the right way out. Then stitch your last section closed.

 

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