Embroidered Viking-style hood

Embroidered Viking-style hood

A while ago I made a few different hooded capelets. The kind of garment to throw over a jacket to add a hood and a bit of shoulder-cozy for the days that don’t need a coat and tuque (knitted hat). Originally I made them just for costuming wear, but with my favourite one, I found that I was wearing it in the fall for mundane wear as well over my leather jacket.

In all of my adventures using the Maker Space’s embroidery machine, I thought one really good use for an embroidered design would be the front panel of one of these hoods.

Third inspired-by-Midgaard hood

Photo credit ©Mysticus Photography – Me in my steel grey wool hood, along with other elements of my Viking Age Norse costume.

Steel charcoal grey wool hood

Once I had the black and grey wool-blend hood finished, I liked the results so much that I went to my stash of other fabrics from the Grandmother’s Fabric Sale and found another piece of wool, also with less than two meters. This fabric is a charcoal grey with a slight steel blue tinge to it. In sewing it I found it very spongy – it did not want to hold a press at all. (It is a tabby weave, not a crepe weave though.) You can see in the photo below my pattern – and the number of adjustments that were made before I got something I really liked.

Second inspired-by-Midgaard hood

Grey and black wool-blend hood

Sewing a second Midgaarb-inspired hood

Although I really liked the plaid hood I blogged about the other day, I thought that it was a bit short, and thought that it would be nicer with a longer, fuller capelet. I had some black-and-grey wool-blend fabric with an interesting square weave left over from another project, and so opted to cut out a second hood from this leftover, with a much longer capelet.

Inspired by Midgaarb

Plaid hood inspired by Midgaarb’s hooded capelets

Lately I’ve been loving the Instagram feed from a costumer from the Pacific Northwest – Midgaarb. She shows off a lot of Viking-inspired costumes, along with beautiful evocative photos of the beauty of the PNW. When I came across a piece of wool-blend plaid in my stash from the April 2017 Grandmother’s Fabric Sale, I immediately thought of Midgaarb’s hooded capelets, and crossed my fingers that the yardage (less than 2 meters) would be enough.

Jorvik-style hood in silk

Front view of the silk hood

I received a number of bags of fabric and clothing not too long ago from my former teacher – she was de-stashing, and so I got to stash-build instead! (Like I need more fabric…. LOL) I kept some of the pieces I thought I could use, and gave away the rest, but one of the pieces I kept was a lovely lightweight silk blouse (with a nasty fringe and some rips around the buttons, so it wasn’t wearable).