Drawing costumes for European medieval fictional characters require more research than drawing a cloth for a contemporary character. This article aims to make this process easier for you. That being said, the fashion style and the fabric preferred in clothes may vary a significant amount based on the country and setting you pick. That’s why, this article will just act as a starting point for your research in determining your clothes. Also, keeping in mind that, medieval age covers approximately around 10 centuries, and is difficult to generalize. But this article intends to establish a rough idea of how to think about those costumes.

Many European based fantasy novels and movies use the medieval age as their setting. For that reason, it is a pretty popular concept. But before creating the costume design, we need to first acquaint ourselves with that age, and then we can create our own design. Note that the knowledge provided here is just for historical reference and does not need to be strictly followed in the costume design.

Let's go over the things to keep in mind when drawing our medieval characters.

LOCAL MATERIALS AND WEALTH OF THE CHARACTERS

In today’s fast fashion age, it may be hard to imagine not being able to reach certain colors and textures, but in the medieval age, access to dyes would be quite difficult. Therefore, we need to also understand our character’s world.

Local or available materials of clothing that are used in a particular region plays an important role in the fashion design. Materials can range from wool, cotton, linen, or animal hides. You can ask how to reflect the clothing material on your drawing. The material generally determines the color of the clothing as well as the quality of that color, i.e. how vibrant the color is. Also, it determines the folds and wrinkles on the clothing. For example, if the clothing fabric is made up of leather, it will have less and wider folds, since the material will be hard and thick. Those thick materials are generally pulled at the bending areas, so you can place the folds there. On the other hand, soft and thin materials, such as; silk, would show more and heavy folds and a lot of small creases. Additionally, a silk fabric would also show soft highlights at certain parts of the fabric.

Here in the image below, I tried to illustrate the differences between two fabrics. So, depending on the status and class of your character, you can pick an appropriate fabric for your character.

Let’s examine the materials of the time.

Wool: The quality of wool would range and be bought depending on your economic status. It is a fabric that takes dye well, and often found in colors of grey, white, black, and red.

Linen: Linen was often used for undergarments and also for veils and wimples, and it did not take dye well. Therefore, linen clothes were generally worn in their own natural color, beige.

Hemp: Hemp was preferred for working clothes and aprons.

Cotton: Cotton was taking dye better, therefore, it was very popular. Cotton clothes could be found in varying colors.

Leather: Leather was also used commonly, especially over tunics. Brightly dyed leather (white or bright yellow) was very expensive and rare. Therefore, generally preferred colors were: brown, black, green, red, and blue.

Silk: Silk was a very expensive and a high-class fabric, and commoners could not afford it or just could not legally use it, due to sumptuary laws.

COLORS OF THE CLOTHING

Related to the previous section, clothing dyes that are available in the region that the character inhabits also determine that place's fashion. The dyes used in a character’s clothing would display his/her economic status. Some of the cheap colors were brown, gray, blue, yellow, orange, and red. Darker and richer colored clothes would be more expensive because they would require more dye, and dye is expensive. Meanwhile, the lighter colored clothes would be cheaper clothes. Additionally, the color velvet started to enter into fashion world around the 14th century, but it was exclusively used for the highest nobility and religious figures.

In addition to the cost of certain dyes, there were additional factors that limit one’s color of clothing, which is the ‘sumptuary law”. According to the laws, poor people were not allowed to wear gold or purple color. Yet, if you are working with a fantasy setting, you can change this rule to your liking. Meanwhile, the rare and expensive colors were purple, scarlet, crimson, and black. So, depending on the status of your character, you can determine your color palette for the clothing.

SOCIAL STATUS AND OCCUPATION

Today, fashion is about distinguishing ourselves as individuals with having distinct clothing styles. However, in the medieval period, the dresses people wore were about displaying membership in a group or a class. Therefore, we need to determine the status and occupation of our characters first. If he is a king, he would wear a surcoat, belt of gold, long stockings, and a lot of silk. If he is a knight, he would wear armor with a padding underneath with patterns made with gold thread. If he is an aristocrat, he would wear more elaborate clothes with silk and fur. If he is a bishop, since he would enjoy the same luxury that nobles do, he would wear jeweled lavish clothes, and a hat called miters. If he is a priest, he would not be as rich as a bishop, therefore he would wear a simple long black gown. If he is a smith, he needs to wear a leather apron and gloves, to protect himself from burning in the front of the fire. Also, a smith would avoid fabrics such as linen since they are easily flammable. Instead, they could use a lot of accessories made up of leathers since it doesn’t burn easily. A ploughman would wear a dense wool hat to protect him from adverse weathers, and a split mitten to protect his hands. A scribe would wear dark clothing, because since his occupation requires a lot of inking, his cloth shouldn’t show much stain. Because, at the time, people had limited amounts of clothing.

Also, if people had a higher economic status, this would present them with more accessories, jewelry, and embroidery in their clothing. And in fact, richer people would have more clothing. Since the fabric is expensive, the more you put in, the wealthier image it would convey. For example, wealthy men would have big sleeves, whereas wealthy women would have more voluminous and longer dresses if they are richer.

AFFILIATION

It is also important to determine the affiliation your character has to a certain group. For example, a knight would typically wear the sigil of his order, family, liege, or a combination of them, as depicted on the image below on the left. A smith could carry a symbol of his guild. Clergy would tend to have a specific hairstyle and a costume shared by their own cult or group, as depicted with an example on the image below on the right. Thieves can also wear something that indicates their affiliation with a certain gang.

Beliefs and superstitions also played a role in one’s garment. Religious people could wear rosaries, icons, or pamphlets. Women who are highly religious would have just gone outside veiled. Meanwhile, superstitious people could wear different sorts of amulets.

There are also some tips that can be used in creating a character's clothing:

DRAWING TIP 1: LAYER IT OUT

It would be helpful, if you keep each piece of clothing on a separate layer. This will give you more freedom with your drawing, as you’d be able to change pieces of clothing more easily, if you don’t like the general outlook. Also, by turning them invisible and visible, you will also be able to concretely visualize how a piece of clothing is interacting with the rest of the clothing.

DRAWING TIP 2: USE GRAYSCALE

Here you can have two options. Firstly, you can create your image in black and white first and then add another layer for coloring. The reason for this is, the human eye is more sensitive to changes in luminosity than chroma. That is, the differences in grayscale are more prominent to the human eye than differences in color. Therefore, if you draw your clothes in black and white, you will capture the contrasts even better, and present a more pleasant color palette, when you begin coloring. Or secondly, you can put your normal coloring without starting out as a grayscale. When you are in your coloring stage, you could sometimes switch back to the grayscale view, so that you would be capturing a better design and color contrast with that. As you can see below, the image on the left, with more contrast (visible in the grayscale version), is more appealing than the one on the right, with less contrast.

MEDIEVAL CHARACTERS FASHION DESIGN

In this section, we will go over the cloths of characters belonging to a certain social status. While examining them, I will give a general view of both early and late medieval ages combined. Yet, there are, indeed, slight differences depending on the period of the medieval era. Especially after the plague that swept through Europe, fashion style has changed. People started showing off more of their body and the way their clothing cut has changed. Nonetheless, I wanted to give an overarching idea of how they would look like.

 

One interesting fact about medieval age fashion is; despite the fact that today underwear is an integral part of our clothing, the medieval people did not think so. Underwear was not really worn by the medieval people. Instead, people in the Middle Ages would rather wear braies and under tunics for men, and smock or chemise for women.

DRAWING A COMMONER WOMAN'S GARMENT

Women wore undergarment made up of linen, which would not only be worn under the daily dresses, but also used at night while sleeping as a bedgown. This would be called as ‘smock’. Over that, they would wear a gown or kirtle at ground-length, made up of colored linen or wool. It had a round neckline and long sleeves. Yet, this piece of cloth’s type changed over time, and in the late Middle Ages, women wore gowns with a wider and more open neckline, displaying more of their figure. The changes were also due to the improvements in tailoring, and more fitting dresses were produced. Since the garments were loose, they would be tied with a belt. Belt would not only give a shape to the dress, but also be used as an instrument to carry items, by tying purses on it. Over this piece of clothing, they would wear a sideless and sleeveless surcoat or over tunic, which also changed in shape depending on the period of middle age. This would serve as an additional layer protective layer from cold, and since it was sideless, women can access the purses attached to the belts easily. Over that, lastly an apron could be worn. This could be adorned with decorative stitches. Below, these dresses, women would wear hose or stockings made up of linen or wool. These hoses will be loose; therefore, they would be kept in place with fabric strips. On that, women would wear leather shoes or boots with leather ties.

This is a drawing I made to represent the dresses and the colors that are allowed. In reality, the colors used could be more faded due to the cost of repeated dying to achieve vibrant colors. But I am drawing these as fictional characters, for that reason, I allowed myself to put on more vibrant colors.

For the cloth, I assumed she is wearing a thick cotton fabric and I drew the creases and folds of the cloth accordingly, with bulky folds.

While drawing the leather shoes, you can leave the stitching on. Since the medieval shoes were more primitive compared to contemporary shoes.

DRAWING A COMMONER MAN'S GARMENT

Men also wore linen undergarments, which they would use day and night. Their socks were also similar to that of women’s, loose and held with a tie. They would wear a smock which would be at knees length and would be skirted. Over that, they would wear tunic or coat. It also had splits like at the sides. On top of all, they would wear a leather belt, to carry things around and hold their clothes tight. Lastly, they would wear leather shoes. Like in the women’s clothing, male garments also changed in the late middle ages, and they became more close-fitting, especially the hose.

DRAWING A KNIGHT'S FORMAL GARMENT

Knight's clothing would carry certain elements that would distinguish them from a regular soldier. Their armor generally included sabatons, which consisted of riveted iron plates. They would also wear greaves for the protection of the calf and ankles, poleyns for the kneecaps, cruises for the thighs, and spurs for the control of the horse. They wore gloves made of leather, metal gauntlets, and a helmet. Knight clothing colors would be unique based on their coat of arms. For daily life, they would wear less formal clothing, but it would still be distinguished. They would wear chain mail shirts called “Hauberk”.

Keeping these facts in mind, you can adjust their costume according to your liking and your fictional setting.

Here, I will give you a brief tutorial on how to draw a knight in their formal costume.

An armor should also give some mobility, in addition to the protection, therefore, we draw those separate segmented shoulder plates, which are connected to each other with bolts. As you see in the leg armor, the back of the knee is left unprotected, to allow full mobility. Armor is worn above a cloth, as depicted in the elbow protection, and attached to the body with buckles and belts.

To draw an armor;

 

1) First started out with flat colors.

2) Determine where the shadows and highlights are.

3) Blend them with the “Blend” tool, with the shortcut of “J”.

4) Get more detailed about the highlights, by adding more sharp white colors, and repeating the same with the shadows, by adding dark colors.

5) Blend them again in a wavy shape.

6) Put in some reflections on the armor, such as its surroundings. The metal armor that medieval knights wore were made up of iron or steel, and they are highly reflective of its surroundings. Here, my knight will be in an isolated place, but let’s say, he is in a wooden house. Then we need to put in a certain brown color in that armor.

7) While doing the edge work, you can put more light there, almost complete white, which will give that a more realistic view. This is not necessarily a continuous line, but you can just place some dots here and there as well.

To draw the chainmail, I created a chainmail brush. You can access it in the assets by typing “Chain Mail Brush” to the search bar. After downloading it, to use it, you need to drag the brush to the pen pro brush palette, and use it however you like.

For chainmail, I first put the gray color where the chainmail is supposed to be. Then I added the chainmail with my brush.

ARISTOCRAT'S GARMENT

Aristocrats would wear elaborate clothing depending on the current dictate of fashion. Expensive pieces such as fur would be used in their clothing. They would generally wear hats to protect their heads from warm or cold weather. Male hats included straw hats, coifs of linen or bonnet-like hemp hats. Meanwhile, women would wear veils, wimples or more complex hats.

 

Wealthy women had clothing pieces similar to the commoner women but made up of luxury fabrics with rich embroidery. Dresses became even more elaborate towards the end of the Middle Ages. Also, waistlines became more emphasized with panniers.

 

 

This concludes my article. Even though throughout this text, I emphasize ‘research, research, and research’, you can use your creativity to add or extract some pieces, and not just go with the age’s requirements, if you are not drawing in a strictly documentary style. I believe there can always be some wiggle room for being unrealistic or anachronistic.

You can find my other work on Instagram @melisdilisen