Costuming Vikings: The Tunics

Inspired by the show Vikings, some truly bad ass costumes I’ve seen at Texas Renaissance Festival and on Pinterest, and wanting to wear a costume in the freezing winds of the Orkney Islands, I began researching Viking costumes with a smidgen of historical accuracy. I made three viking dresses, embellished two sets of tunics, and assembled/made quite a few accessories for myself, my husband, my friends, and my mother to wear in Orkney and at Texas Renaissance Festival. Since I made so many items and took a ton of pictures, I’ve had to break it up into five separate blog posts. This post focuses on the tunics for the guys.

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My costume to-do list can get a little out of control, so with mine and Katy’s viking dresses finished, and the British Isles cruise quickly approaching, I decided to not reinvent the wheel with our guys’ costumes. They purchased pre-made viking tunics from Medieval Collectibles that I would embellish with yarn trim. My husband ordered the grey (it’s more like slate blue) outer tunic with cream under tunic, and my friend ordered the green outer tunic with cream under tunic. Katy and I picked out yarn colors for our guys that would complement their coloring and our dresses.

I used the same decorative cording technique, the zig zag stitch with the cord foot, as I did with Katy’s apron dress. I stitched a double row of yarn around each tunic’s neck, sleeves, and bottom. And then I stitched additional double rows on each outer tunic’s neck.

I allowed myself to get a little sloppy with the yarn trim, as I intentionally didn’t want this to look store bought. I love how they turned out!!

The rest of our costumes pieces, including the dresses for us ladies, are below. We wore these ensembles in Orkney during our British Isles cruise in September. Also included is my mother’s under dress and apron dress, worn at Texas Renaissance Festival last month.

Costuming Vikings: The Dresses

Costuming Vikings: The Accessories

Costuming Vikings: The Cape

Costuming Vikings: The Style

 

Next…Costuming Vikings: The Accessories


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