Turn Back the Clock with a Renaissance Costume

Many people think costumes are just for Halloween. Scary monsters and mythical creatures—vampires, Frankenstein, werewolves and dragons. Costumes modeled after movie characters and television characters, all intended to celebrate the holiday but also help the wearer be a little more popular in the eyes of his or her peers. However, there are other occasions where costumes are necessary, and the ultimate goal of the costume depends on these occasions. Some costume balls require the visitors to be dressed in sexy outfits, costumes that hide their faces but also accentuate their bodies. Sometimes these balls are even based in specific time periods.

But there is another kind of costume festival—the Renaissance fair. And at a Renaissance fair, a Renaissance costume is a necessity. A Renaissance costume allows the wearer to feel like he or she is back in the golden days of England, the days of knights and jesters, kings and queens. It also brings out the personality in the wearer. But overall, it helps to recreate history, to act out the past in perfect detail, and to get a better understanding and conception of the collective history of humankind.

A Knight’s Tale

At Renaissance fairs, the Renaissance

comes to life. There are jousts and swordfights, fire eating and archery. Entire turkey drumsticks and pints of ale. Visitors are not required to wear costumes, but most do, and all of the participants take pride in their wardrobes. A Renaissance costume can be modeled after any number of Renaissance characters. Knights and royalty are popular, but so are jesters and peasants. In the end, a Renaissance costume of this scale is not often bought in a store—instead, it is hand-crafted from materials and various acquisitions of antiques. Even the weapons are carefully cared for, and some are even made by their users, if of course they wear the Renaissance costume of a blacksmith.

Unlike Halloween, a Renaissance fair is more than just a random collection of costumes—it is a carefully-orchestrated celebration of an entire period of history. The participants take their work seriously; many of them travel the country, or the world, participating in similar events, and many take their costume making and acting to serious extremes. A Renaissance costume embodies both the spirit of the past and the spirit of the future—the spirit of history and the spirit of the wearer. The final product is breathtaking, moving and unique—it is like turning back the hands of time.