Post event-season costume care

 Yesterday we arrived home after Medieval Week in Visby. Medieval week is our main historical event of the year. I mostly spend time in the kitchen, and this year I hardly took any photos at all, also we didn't have any new clothes, even if I had fixed my husband's short hosen, so not much when it comes to costuming things to share here.

This was my look for most of the time, I wore my new under kirtle and then my giant apron, and as you can see, after a week cooking on an open hearth it was really dirty. The dirt doesn't come so much directly from the fire, but all the pots and pans that we need get very sooty, and even if they are cleaned on the inside on the outside they are dirty, and when you lift them and move the around, or brush against them, well the soot ends up on me.

We took the early morning ferry home from Gotland, which made me really tired, but coming home already around 3 pm meant that I had time to actually start caring for my things, and I had also taken today off from work for that. All our cutlery and kitchen stuff got in the dishwasher and could be packed away. I also prepared the linen and cotton clothing by putting them in a soak with water and some "galltvål" ( a brand of traditional washing soap). I had extra soap on all the major stains and the cuffs and collars as well. I don't have my own washing machine or balcony, but the shared washerroom in my building was free for the early morning pass. So I went up early, did some extra scrubbing on the stains and then put the linen and cottons in the machine. I also put our wool socks in the machine, on a wool program, to get them really clean.

Then I occupied the grass and patio area of my house block. The white linens were put on the grass to get bleached by the sun and grass, it was a bit cloudy so didn't get the best effect. The cottons and non-white linens were hung up to dry and the wools were aired. I kept everything there for a couple of hours, until my nose deemed that the wool didn't stink anymore and the linen stuff was dry. The beige underkirtle had some soot stains on it at the hem, but I spot cleaned that with spirit vinegar (ättika) and that was enough.

Then it was my husband's time to do his part, which is to care for the shoes before they are put away. The were cleaned and treated and the shoe blocks were put in. For his cowmule shoes he doesn't have shoe blocks that are square, but he uses regular shoe blocks and stuffs the toes with some scraps of fabric to fill them out.

Then it was up to the attic to sort everything into the storage. My system is that I keep on plastic box for each subtype of clothing, so one box for shirts, one for underkirltes, one for headwear and so on. His landsknecht outfit all gets into the same box though, to keep it all together. I also have cedar wood balls in all the boxes, to protect the clothes. Then I stack them on top of each other, but now I can't fit more boxes into the space so we will see what happens if I make new clothes.

And with that it was done, and I think this is a new record for me to get everything packed away after Medieval Week.