Ringsted Medieval Festival

I am so thrilled, not only is my city hosting a medieval festival August 2012, but I am voulentering this year! Not sure what I'll be doing yet :) but I can't wait to get started. When the festival was last held in 2010 and Robert and I visited both days. The engagement rings was also bought there by one of the vendors with a 12-1400 inspired pattern:

Actually I have been talking to a woman who got married there a few years back. I have seen the pictures and I think it looked amasing.

Just wanted to share this amasing news with you :-) and drop off a few photos of the Ringsted medieval Festival if any Danish bride could be tempted to get married there. The great thing about this festival is that they take pride in not mixing thime periods, they even take care not to confuse late and early medieval clothing. There's not any fantasy vendors or renaissance clothing to confuse the guests. Somehow I really appreciate that, as much as I fancy fantasy myself.

Card Box

Weddings have become international now because of the internet and so many new traditions are made when brides from all over the world come together with their massive amount of creative ideas. I particularly like the Offbeatbride.com because it embraces untraditional brides from all cultures.
Anyway the new thing is to make boxes for the cards that the guests always bring along with the presents, and I like the idea. Obviously it got me thinking about what a medieval wedding would use as a card box when a fellow medieval bride showed her wonderful cardbox, this cool wooden chest that her fianceé brought home:

It made me think that I actually have a little wooden shrine of my own that I got at a flea market with red velvet fabric inside. Right now it's holding my crystals - yay sooo shiny :-P but they can get another home while it acts cardbox at the wedding.

Finally - I don't remember where I got this photo, but I think it's kind of cute, and probably more in line with a medieval peasents' wedding cardbox would look like (not that they had cardboxes in medieval times!):

If you like the idea as well, just go searching for wooden trunks and chests :-)

Amasing Medieval Photoshoot from El Costurero Real

I came across an etsy artist, El Costurero Real, selling pretty medieval inspired dresses. I couldn't get the pictures out of my head, so I digged a little and found out that the talented woman had a website and a blog.

In coorporation with Pedro Velasco y Andrea Gomez, they set up a photoshoot for this beautiful medieval wedding and I have to show you some of the photos from the shoot: Boda Medieval .


Loving cup ceremony

They styled everything from the dress to the food, I think the dining shots are particularly great, with the wooden table, cups and bowls, the tent upheld by ribbon bound poles and of course the amasing costumes.

I think anyone planning a medieval wedding will find these photos inspiring, I got goose bumps myself, and I liked the forrest setting, the green ivory arch, the rose petals and the golden colors of the fabrics:

I wont post anymore pictures because I think you should go to her blog and check the rest out yourself. Really stunning!

The medieval wedding ceremony



From an amasing wedding posted in
the Londond Evening Standard

It's kind of strange that I have been writing on this blog for over 6 months about medieval weddings but I haven't mentioned the actual ceremony yet, so here it comes.
The Middle Ages was a long period and therefore the cermonial part of the wedding probably changed some over time. The church had great power but it took some time for the Christian ways to beat the older tradtions and form into that solidified ritual we know today.

From what I can gather the medieval ceremony was a very undefined thing. They only thing that was required for a marriage to be legally binding was consent between man and wife followed sooner or later by sex. A secret runaway wedding in the forest without a priest was as binding as the formal one where all guests gathered as witnesses.

From StyleMePretty

The church did prefere the ceremonies involving a priest as it was easier if the couple wanted an annulment when there had been no priest or family there to witness that it actually took place. And divorce was a sin at the time.
In the late Medieval Times the common way to have a ceremony was to walk with all the guests up to the church. Outside the church the couple would declare their consent and the priest would bless their union. Then everyone would go inside and attend mass.


From Facta et dicta memorabilia - second quarter of the 15th century

In Denmark a wedding is called "Bryllup" which derives from the old word Brudhlaup which means: Bridal run. It comes from a tradition where the entire wedding party would walk through the city in a procession. I am not certain if this was a demonstration of the magnitude of the wedding or simply a way to celebrate.

If you want a ceremony that's medieval you can almost make up want you want as there was no specific rules as to how it should be. If you prefere an outdoor wedding it will be as accurate as a wedding in a church. We have some litterary sources of the cermoniel words dating back to the renaissance that probably derives from medieval ceremonies.

If you want to read a little more my source was this article by Sharon L. Krossa

Dress of the month - November

This golden empire waist gown is designed and made by Corinne Roes of Atelier Mette Maelwael, from the Netherlands.

It's not for sale, but made as a replica to a museum and meant as an inspiration for you all, so you can see the difference between this and the early slim and simple dresses.
The shape is characteristic for the 15th century with its big skirt, high waist and the v-shaped collar*. Also the conic hat with a veil is typical for the period. I believe the type of dress was called a Houpelande.

It was made by using at the picture below as an inspiration. Frankly I think it's very romantic and brings to mind princesses locked away in tall towers without any doors.

The Romance of Tristan; France, 1468



Wedding tree guestbook

I have seen this idea on most blogs by now, but I want to publish it here as well because I actually think it could fit a medieval wedding really well.
The concept is that you draw a tree on a big piece of paper, then you find different colored ink pads that the guests can press their fingers in and then leave a gren/yellow/red finger print on the tree as a leaf. Underneath they can write their name if they want to.
The reason I love this idea, is that many medieval people could not read or write and what better way to leave a mark on the wedding that this?

Arn the knight templar: Cecilia's hair

I was watching the first Arn - the templar knight, the other evening. I do like that movie, although the book is far better. Anyway I can see that you often come to this blog looking for medieval wedding hair. Obviously a movie cannot provide us historically accurate hair styles, but they can inspire us and as a lot of movies takes pride in historical clothing, they also try to copy the hair dos of the period. Cecilia, the heroine, has a couple of hair styles that I could really see at a wedding.

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The braided bun above is beautiful. Medieval paintings are full of smal buns of braided hair, although I have never seen one placed in the back of the head. It requires a great amount of hair to make it that big, but I am sure hairdressers have their tricks if you want something similar. It reminds me a bit of this Jessica Alba picture:

This very artistic braided and curled hair lokks very much like a fairy tale princess. This elaborate style is more common in the renaissance or in Italy 15th century while nortern Europe still are in the middle ages. The Arn movie takes place in the 12th century if I remember correctly. From the paintings of that century this next hair style is the one that fits the best:

This simple and flattering hair do is the one that appeals the most to me. You can easily wear a wreath or a crown with it. The long loose wavy style can be seen in manuscripts like the Codex Manesse:

Hope you found these three examples helpful :-)