The next item in our advent calendar is the puffy pants. They are typical of the Viking Age (the oldest record dates from around 750) and similar trousers do not appear again until the 16th century.

We know the wide trousers from several depictions. There we can see that they are very wide and wrinkled and end somewhere around the knees. We can get more information about how they were constructed from a few fragments from the crotch area in Hedeby. There it seems like they were cut in the same way as the close-fitting trousers, but in a completely different fabric. Instead of broken diamond twill the fragments from Hedeby are made of thin wool crepe, a fabric that creates wrinkels by itself. The main fragment is red at the front and green at the back and the legs are made in double layers of fabric.

Because the trousers are very wide they need to be gathered to the waistband and the bands at the bottom. There are no finds of these areas, but based on how other garments were gathered during the Viking age we can guess that they had narrow, round creases which were sewn to the bands in every little crease. Wide folds are based on garment history the least probable alternative.

The trouser on the picture to the left are made in wool muslin and not wool crepe which is harder to find. The have quite nice wrinkles anyhow.

You can buy our patterns for close-fitting trouser here: Trousers