Coming up this weekend in Colorado is a Renaissance Faire that we think is interesting for the reasons you’ve probably already figured out from the title. The Ravenshire Renaissance and Pirate Faire is a unique blend of the Renaissance in the year 1550 and Pirates of the 18th Century, all mixing together in the mysterious darkness of nighttime.

Their site offers some sketches of period-appropriate costumes, and some photos of last year’s daytime do (see above) but we’ve got a few ready and waiting for you in our Medieval and Renaissance Costumes Section.

For those who want to be upper class women, our Masquerade Queen (shown above) and Baroness fit their description – “Women of this time wore tight, conical bodices over full, cone-shaped skirts. Sleeves were long and tight, and usually had either puffed and padded sleevecaps or large, false stuffed undersleeves. Chemises were worn beneath all to protect the clothing from dirt and sweat.”

For the men, we’ve got the Renaissance Nobleman or the Noble Knight , both of whom are shown in the photo above.

The Ravenshire website also tells us that working class people would have worn garments made of solid, textured fabrics in colors obtainable through natural and local dyes--blue in almost all shades was a very common peasant color--as you can see in one of the photos above. Women wore a stiffened bodice as an all-in-one garment rather than a separate dress and corset. They could get away with shorter skirts (which in 1550 meant ankle-length!). When working, they would hitch their skirts up over their belt. Working men often wore leather aprons and long pants instead of short breeches and hose.

Our Female Renaissance Peasant Dress is shown above with the thoughtful fellow in the Male Renaissance Peasant costume. And we’ve got lots of Pirate costumes that are so fun to look at we hope you’ll check all of them out!