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 The fashion of Renaissance, inspired by further development of humanity and awareness of individual personality, was conceived in Italy - the cradle of Renaissance. Since middle ages Italy has been one of the most civilized and cultural countries of Europe where the traditions of Ancient Art and the consciousness of its own historical significance have endured. Antiquity was the standard of the art work quality there.
The hope and faith in renovation and revival of that unforgettable
time probably veined in Florence, which was not only the center of
cultural and public life of the country, but it was also famous for its
economic prosperity caused by production of fabrics and fashionable
accessories. Therefore, the conditions for appearing of new fashion -
the Renaissance fashion were the most favorable there.
The most
important feature of new fashion was the fact that it did not bare
human body and its parts as Ancient Art did, it did not emphasize them
as the naturalistically oriented Gothics in its zenith, but it knew how
to understand human body as a plastically whole object. The new fashion
rejected everything, that contradicted its harmonious understanding of
symmetry and moderation, it also knew how to avoid superfluously
extravagant components of the previous fashion. It forewent the
unnatural position of belt, which was sometimes too low - on the
thighs, and sometimes too high - above the waist; it rejected long
sharp-nosed shoes, deep pointed dress cuts, elongated angled sleeves,
and all tall hats.
Instead, the Renaissance fashion adopted new canons
which corresponded to the ideals of those days. Moreover, it dictated
the precise standards of beauty which remain true up to now: tall
figure, wide shoulders, thin waist, beautiful mouth, white teeth, red
lips, noble motions and well-built figure. The new fashion also paid
attention to the hair style and hair color, breast shape and man
height. In this case human criteria were the most significant ones and,
therefore, it spoke against the unnaturalness of Gothic fashion. For
example, prior to Renaissance, during its zenith and later, fair hair
was considered to be the utmost feature of beauty, as it was understood
in Italy.
This requirement was met by different means. At that time
Italian women knew several methods of changing the hair color. Hair was
colored or covered by something resembling modern wigs made of laid-on
vividly yellow hair. The unnaturally high forehead, not framed by hair,
was the main requirement of new fashion. Smoothness of the forehead
lines should not have been disrupted even by eyebrows, which were
pulled out not only by women, but by men as well. It was prescribed by
fashion, and it was reported by Balthazar Castillione in his records
dated 1516.
Every woman was a master of make-up. Ekaterina Sforts's
manual shows us all the methods used for a perfect make-up. The threads
of pearls and corals were intertwined with hair, and hair dresses were
decorated with special meshes and covers. All fashion requirements were
carried out very strictly, and each Italian Renaissance portrait is a
witness to that. Like everything else, the Renaissance fashion was
scientifically detailed. Renaissance gave birth to literature about
clothing, first manuals how to dress up and apply make-up, and to be
up-to-date with fashion. These requirements are laid out in Italian
literature with rare sincerity.
Women of that epoch wore two kinds of
dresses: a lower dress with long sleeves and above it an upper dress, a
kind of a gown with wide sleeves, called gamurra. Florence, which
precisely became rich producing and exporting woolen cloth, preferred
silk, brocade, velvet and so forth for itself. Rigid and difficult for
sewing fabrics, for example, brocade with large patterns, most
frequently with pomagranate apple motives, demanded new cut and new
drapery of folds. The woman's dress of the XV century is folded in a
special way, creating wide, symmetrical folds, which resemble the calm
rhythm of Renaissance architecture. The dress, which in Gothics period
covered tightly figure and streamed from delicate, lowered arms,
considerably more stresses flesh and body-building in Renaissance
fashion. During this period woman's clothes became strictly divided by
pattern into a long skirt and a bodice, often laced, with a little oval
cut. The correlation of bodice and skirt expressed the ideal balance of
body parts in Italian fashion, i.e. the same tendencies, that we see in
Italian architecture,'made to fit a man'. According to Renaissance
fashion theorists, mainly women, fashionable clothes had to be rich in
the first place. And the wealth was revealed not only in expensive
fabrics and their patterns, but also in the shape of the sleeves. An
elegant narrow sleeve of the Renaissance dress of the second half of
the XV century was cut first on elbows, and later in the armholes,
thus, white underwear could be seen. At this time the combination of
two colors and two fabrics marked the beginning of dress deformation,
which was a special feature of mannerism. The underwear became the most
luxurious part of clothing due to the fact that white material has
always been the most expensive.
The Renaissance fashion for men
was ruled by two lines. Just as in the antique times, in the
Renaissance period, young people and dandies wore rather catchy short
suits, based on the antique tunic, which was supplemented with sleeves
and different eccentric accessories. Such garments usually reached
knees, but sometimes they were considerably shorter and revealed tight
eccentric pants made of the fabric of different color. And since
brocade, velvet and damask cloths were in fashion, tailors sew rigid
material in symmetrical rounded folds instead of the usual ones not to
lose the pattern of the fabric. Another line included man's raincoat
with sleeves and wide collar, richly folded and descending to the
ground. Although such raincoats had their purpose, however they
acquired the symbolic meaning: because of its "worthy" nature such
outfit became the emblem of scientific, elderly people and
intellectuals. No wonder that this classical Renaissance garment was
preserved to the present, and the entire world uses it as official
university clothing for different ceremonies. A small but very
important group of people - secular intellectuals - appeared in Italy
in the New Learning epoch, it never existed up to the Gothics. And "the
scientist's raincoat", used by all groups of population, is a
reflection of this phenomenon in fashion.
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