Advice on garb, for newcomers and people with limited wardrobes
Here are some tips for Getting Some Garb Together to wear to an SCA event. These tips are aimed at getting you some passable European-style garb that will work for Dark Ages through to early Medieval period. The sections are: Making, Purchasing new, Purchasing second-hand, Modern substitutes, Other Items, Things not to wear.
The standard to attend an SCA event is ‘an attempt at pre-1600 clothing’. You don’t have to be perfect, but you do need to make some effort. You want clothes that you can wear all day and be active in, not just costumes.
If you want to purchase something online, you can email the URL to the Chatelaine (chatelaine@sg.lochac.sca.org) and they can look at it for you and tell you whether it is worth it, or whether you are about to waste your money.
The first things to obtain are your outer-layer top-half-of-body garments. Unfortunately, these are also the hardest and most expensive to purchase.
Making
If you want to make some garb (or twist the arm of someone to make it for you), the basic tunic is highly recommended. It can be long and feminine, short and masculine, or someplace in between. It’s comparatively easy to sew, it suits practically any body shape, you can wear modern undergarments, and it’s easy to layer a bigger one over a slightly smaller one for warmth. A good tutorial on making a basic tunic is this PDF from the Canton of Dragons Bay in WA.
If that sounds too hard, or you are in a hurry, or you have children that grow a lot, consider making a tabard. A basic tabard is a rectangle of cloth that is a bit wider than your torso, has a hole for your head, and hangs down to just above the knee front and back. It’s then done up with a belt. Tabards are simple, but they aren’t warm, and can shift around annoyingly.
Here is a tutorial for an 11th C hood that is ideal for cold weather and has a very easy pattern: (Skjoldehamn hood tutorial on the Handcrafted History site).
For clothing next to your skin, use linen or cotton. For an outer layer, use linen, cotton, or wool. This is for comfort, and so you are not flammable beside the campfire. If you must use a fabric with a synthetic blend, make sure that the synthetic component is less than 40%. If wool will be next to your skin, e.g., in a hood, check that you can tolerate the texture. Use woven fabrics, not knits. Get a plain solid colour, or a very simple geometric pattern like checks. Your early garb is not the time to be dealing with fabrics that have right and wrong sides, or one-way patterns. Get a colour that you like and that suits you. If you are using new fabric, wash it before you cut and sew it, in case of shrinkage and to wash away any manufacturing chemicals.
Purchasing new
There are no NZ commercial makers, so you will be ordering from overseas. Here are some big-name places (URLs valid as at late 2025), in approximately increasing quality and price order.
- Etsy: varies wildly from very good to indifferent.
- Medieval Collectables and By the Sword may be OK if you get it reviewed by someone knowledgeable first.
- Burgschneider: their fabrics can be a bit coarse, and their patterns aren’t authentic and are scanty on fabric, but they will do.
- Revival Clothing: their patterns aren’t authentic but the overall look is reasonable. Assembly quality can be a bit iffy.
- Armstreet: patterns are not always authentic, and trims can be a bit glitzy, but generally good fabric and good assembly.
- Lochac Classifieds Facebook group: generally good quality, but only a few items are offered each month.
- Historic Enterprises: pretty good stuff, but they don’t always carry much in stock.
- Linengarb.com: good reputation, I haven’t personally tried, don’t always carry much in stock.
Commercial new ‘medieval’ clothes on Temu, Trademe and eBay are almost all rubbish, especially if they are cheap.
Purchasing second-hand
Sometimes clothes come up at events at markets or by advertisement within the Barony. Sometimes clothes come up on eBay, but the postage can be fearsome. Clothes sometimes come up on TradeMe. Home-crafted new garb sometimes comes up on TradeMe and can be worthwhile.
Occasionally you can re-purpose modern clothing. Princess-line dresses, peasant or pirate shirts, kaftans, tunics, Indian-style clothing, and collarless shirts might work, but ask a knowledgeable person first; there are many people in the Barony who will be pleased to answer your query on Facebook or one of the email lists.
Things that you can substitute with modern clothes
- trousers: any plain trousers, preferably in natural fibres. Avoid modern jeans denim, and also avoid cargo pants, because pockets down the legs wasn’t a thing.
- thermal under-garments: any unobtrusive colour will be ok (grey, tan, blue).
- non-thermal undergarments: t-shirts in unobtrusive colours, checking that the neck band doesn’t stick out strangely.
- socks: with trousers, ordinary socks. With skirts, school uniform over-the-knee or just-under-the-knee socks are great. Plain dull colours, of course.
- belts: go to KMart or similar and get a man’s leather or leather-effect belt in your size with a plain silver or bronze coloured buckle.
- tights: can be footed or footless, thermal or not. Just make sure they are heavy enough to be opaque, i.e. not pantyhose.
- shoes: black or brown flat-soles shoes, ideally slip-on but lace-up if that’s what you have. For outdoor events, consider leather work boots or ankle gumboots.
- sunhats: a straw/straw-look broad-brimmed hat or a felt broad-brimmed hat will be a good thing.
Other items
These are useful things to have at an event.
- cloaks: a rectangular wool blanket or woven wool throw, a bit smaller than single-bed size, although you may be able to wear a full single if you are tall. And bonus! you can use it as a blanket at night. Plain colours such brown, grey, off-white, green.
- smaller throws and lap blankets can be worn as shawls.
- cloak pins, brooches: kilt pins, they come in a variety of sizes and colours, at sewing shops and school uniform shops. Bling is a thing.
- bags: there are many cloth sewing and tote bags available, but faced with a time or money problem, take one of the black Woolworths or Pak-n-Save supermarket bags, and turn it inside-out to hide the logo.
- natural-colour baskets are usable as is.
- a mixed pack of safety pins, somewhere in your kit, for emergency hold-togethers.
- an apron: better to wear an apron when helping in the kitchen than to get your garb dirty.
- if you need assistive clothing or devices, e.g. glasses, hearing aids, special shoes, limb braces, walking sticks: please go right ahead and use them. We want everyone to be safe and comfortable.
Things not to wear
These things will not fit in at an event; too modern or just wrong.
- skimpy clothes, including short sleeves, shorts, and short skirts. It wasn’t the style at the time. Also, SCA events often have a significant outdoor component. You will burn, or freeze, or possibly both.
- corsets as outerwear.
- modern logos and screen-prints.
- armour and weapons other than their intended purpose as fighting equipment.
- non-human elements, e.g. elf ears, animal tails
Crowns, coronets and tiaras have special meaning in the SCA, to indicate rank. If you come to an event wearing any of these, you will asked to put them away.