Smocked Apron

Aprons seem to be a pretty popular item in the early and middle Medieval periods. You can find images of aprons n men and women in various manuscripts. This  Larsdatter  page gives lots of links to many manuscripts. While most of them seem to simply be pieces of fabric tied around the waste occasionally, such as in the image of the woodcut Melencolia by Albrecht Durer, you can see a smocked apron being worn by the women.

While I usually play an Anglo-Saxon or Norse persona in the SCA I do like to learn new techniques. In April I was privileged to take a class on smocking at an A&S day hosted by our Baron and Baroness. The concept of the class was to learn how to smock and then create an apron.

I am one of those visual learners. If I see something being done I can usually pick it up immediately.  If I have to read the instructions and look at pictures I will struggle for ages to learn a new skills.


Smocking turned out to be one of the few that I struggled with even though I was shown, not once but twice. I became so frustrated that I put the apron away until we got home. Once I picked it back up I found that a trough, the bit of fabric that was supposed to be down, was picked up and sewn into my pleats on the first row. This completely threw my stitching out of synch.

To correct the issue, after the fourth or fifth time I started and restarted the pleating, I simply doubled up the column of pleats for that one area. That allowed me to complete the pleating and move on to making and adding the the wasteband.


Another mistake I made was using a very light weight linen fabric. This means the apron looks pretty but isn't very likely to be all that useful for cooking or any other task where an apron would be nice to have around. But it does look nice and will look good if I ever decide to dress as a 12th -14th century peasant for one of our indoor events.