This article on medieval shoes (of all things) is absolutely fascinating. The points today have nothing on the medieval lot, so long and dangerous were the shoes that Henry IV attempted to regulate the practice. http://www.medievalists.net/2013/10/16/medieval-shoes/

Although, apparently, the fashion is now being re-instated in Mexico.........



And the 15thC Austrian bras I think we have all seen, but these bikini pants? Remarkably similar to today



http://www.medievalists.net/2012/07/17/medieval-lingerie-discovery-in-austria-reveals-what-really-was-worn-under-those-tunics/

Janet Stephens, a hairdresser with a love of history researches and duplicates historical hair styles using authentic hairdressing tools of the time.  The videos are fascinating, and the amount of research and practice that must go into each recreation is impressive. I suppose a knowledge of hair and tools of the trade would help too.

Recreating the Vestal Seni Crines




And 18th century Papillote curls




For anyone interested, there are many more videos of varying styles on Youtube. Just type Janet Stephens into the search box.

One for the girls here - a sketch of every dress worn by the Best Actress Academy Award winner since 1929:

http://mashable.com/2014/03/02/oscar-best-actress-gown/

I shall now, with some relish, look for a site that shows the terrible mistakes made by some of the ladies involved in this annual Hollywood ritual. I still gleefully (and rather spitefully) remember Ms Paltrow's pink frock that didn't quite fit and Bjork's Dead Duck creation (which was actually quite a funny send-up of the whole nonsense):






Right, back to the serious stuff now - where's me Plato?  

'Tis not just the girls who make strange sartorial choices.

As would be expected of a Queen, Margaret of Denmark wife of James III of Scotland, had quite an impressive wardrobe. Even so, this seems quite extravagant for the time.

Margaret’s jointure, settled on her with her marriage to the King, was the highest allowed under the law of Scotland. The Lord Treasurer was entrusted with the task of paying the Queen’s expenses and because we have his records from 1473-4, we have a brief glimpse into the everyday life of a Scottish queen consort. The accounts for this year show Margaret spent the vast amount of £757:9:10 on clothing (equivalent to £498,000 today).
The fashion of the time was for women to wear long dresses called kirtles underneath gowns. These gowns were like indoor coats. During the time period of records that we have, Margaret had at least fifteen gowns. Ten of these were in regal colors: six in black, two in purple and two in crimson. Black was used for mourning but was also considered very fashionable. Other colors of her gowns were tawny, brown and blue. The materials varied. Five were velvet, five were damask, two were satin and one was made of silk.
Each gown required three to five ells of fabric. An ell was equivalent to 36”. The gowns had different linings such as cloth, fur, velvet, buckram and silk. In August of 1473, Margaret wore a new black riding gown on pilgrimage after the birth of her first son James. This gown had a velvet collar and trimmings on the sleeves. In the next month she had a gown made of crimson satin that was trimmed with no less than forty grey squirrel skins. Large numbers of grey squirrel furs were purchased in 1474 to line gowns and cloaks and to make collars. She had five new cloaks created all in black. Two of them were lined with the grey fur and two with damask. The documents record that on one occasion the Queen personally bought ermine skins.
We know less about her kirtles but these would have required six or seven ells of material. During the time period of the records she had at least a dozen kirtles crafted. They were black, crimson, green and blue and made of satin, damask, silk and velvet and were usually lined with cloth or satin.
The headdresses worn by the queen were very elaborate and we know one of her “dress bonnets” was lined with crimson satin that had been used for one of her kirtles. There is a record of her buying gloves from a Stirling skinner and she also owned a large ostrich feather, probably used in a headdress. She also owned a “poke of lavender” meaning a small bag, possibly a sachet. Margaret had a royal shoemaker named Hude and some of her shoes had cork heels. The records show she wore black hose and had some white foot socks which she may have worn when riding horses.
One of Margaret’s remarkable outfits was manufactured for her to wear to Parliament in May of 1474. The records show seven ells of red crimson for her long gown were purchased for £31:10/- and another ten ells were needed at a cost of £40. For another gown in the same year, fifteen ells of damask were acquired for £28:10/-. Twice the amount of material was needed for a ceremonial gown due to the long train the occasion demanded. These gowns would have been worn with the Queen’s impressive jewelry.
There is an inventory record which has survived of what Margaret owned when she died at Stirling Castle on July 14, 1486. This record is the first list of jewels belonging to a Scottish Queen. The list includes a crimson belt decorated with gold and braid. She had four other gold belts. She owned two gold chains with one having sixty-one links and another fifty-six links. One of her collars was made of chalcedony which is a translucent or grayish semiprecious stone that is a variety of banded quartz. Hanging from this collar was a pendant in the shape of a filigree pomander. She had a collar made of gold enameled roses. Another collar was set with sixteen rubies and had diamonds and double pearls and was also engraved. The main feature of this collar was eight white enameled swans.

http://www.medievalists.net/2014/03/19/wardrobe-margaret-denmark-queen-scotland/

Why does this make me think of Wallace and Gromit?

The world's oldest trousers, thought to be about 3000 years old, have been found in a grave in northern China. What I want to know is; were they worn low slung to show off the world's oldest underpants? I wonder how often they were recovered from the charity shop bag?

http://www.thehistoryblog.com/archives/30759

Fascinating how they were constructed, with each leg woven as one piece to exactly the correct size. 

Did people even wear underpants back then ferval? Although with the britches woven from wool, they'd be a bit scratchy without them surely.  

Temperance wrote:

One for the girls here - a sketch of every dress worn by the Best Actress Academy Award winner since 1929:

http://mashable.com/2014/03/02/oscar-best-actress-gown/

I shall now, with some relish, look for a site that shows the terrible mistakes made by some of the ladies involved in this annual Hollywood ritual. I still gleefully (and rather spitefully) remember Ms Paltrow's pink frock that didn't quite fit and Bjork's Dead Duck creation (which was actually quite a funny send-up of the whole nonsense):






Right, back to the serious stuff now - where's me Plato?  

I rather like Bjerk for her quirkiness and, as Temperance rightly says, sending up the whole sometimes silly event.  I'm not saying they don't sometimes get it right.  I thought the Oscars were going to the fiery furnace in a handcart the year somebody announced Olivia Newton-John (of whom I admit I am not a fan so maybe my opinion is biased) as something like [slight paraphrase possible] "the cutest thing to come out of Australia since the koala bear".  A) ONJ was born in the UK though she did go to live in Australia during her childhood B) in my opinion Skippy the Bush Kangaroo was much cuter than ONJ.  Also didn't "Braveheart" win a cartload of Oscars one year - the film in which it was intimated that William Wallace might have made Isabella of France pregnant (at a time when the real Isabella would have been 9 years old).  I know there have been very young mothers but a Princess of France at 9 years old without her chaparone, I think not.

I'm not going to say anything more about the "What Eugenie Wore" matter [on the "Royal Bodies" thread], but it made me think about the recent hullabaloo about those cheeky Australians printing a photograph (if I have it right) of a gust of wind blowing the Duchess of Cambridge's dress up and her thereby showing something of an eyeful.  It was mean of them to print it (and I'm not a person who automatically thinks the royal family are in the right just because of the rank they hold), but I thought haute couture designers (does the DoC wear haute couture???] had weights inserted into the hems of dresses and jackets to try and prevent this problem. I don't necessarily want to condemn the DoC to a life of wearing "granny pannies" but I guess her advisers will address the matter for the future, maybe by the weights in the hem route). Sometimes I have seen young women wearing low-slung jeans with thongs underneath who have bent over and have shown more than they meant to.  I have always been too cowardly to say anything like "Sites of London" - which was a coded manner of saying one was showing too much in my youth - in such a case.  Part of me thought it would be decent to let the person know but the other part has thought they might take offence.  A hard one to call..........

Not that I can say I always got things right in my youth.  I once wore red long johns under a green mini dress - not my best ever sartorial choice.

Triceratops wrote:

Have been reading about the Zoot Suit Riots which took place in Los Angeles 70 years ago.

The Zoot Suiters are believed to be one of the first examples of teenage counter-culture in Western society. And neither were the great changes in dress codes which took place in the middle decades of the 20th Century restricted to teenagers. There are others. For example the Zoot Suiters would never have been seen bare-headed outdoors. When did people (men and women) stop wearing hats? Did this begin in the 1940s? And when did the number of people without hats surpass those with hats - the 1950s or the 1960s?

Beware of those who still wear hats - especially when they are driving.

People still wore hats to church or into town in my community in the 1950s, maybe even the 1960s.  And most men wore hats when I was young - just the other day I asked my aunt if there was any reason why my father, in contrast, never wore a hat. She though he just didn't like them.  They were all still wearing hats well into the 50s and later.  NZ might have been slower to pick up a new fashion than the British of course.

In Britain recently (Lincoln to be precise) I bought a lovely black and red cloche hat, which I have actually worn a couple of times, though rather self-consciously.  It looks very good (and has been worn to some rave reviews - though also to some doubt, I feel), and if I were better at sending photos I would put one here.  Or perhaps not, my husband taking the photo told me to put my head down, so I have my head down a little and my eyes looking up, giving me an oddly coy look.  Quite 1920s though.  But running round my rural town of 350 wearing a nice hat feels a bit odd.

A hat or "substantial fascinator" was de rigeur for ladies in the Royal enclosure at Ascot (not sure they didn't insist on hats last time), apart from that ladies seem to wear hats at weddings and funerals. Other than those of advancing years, few men round here appear hatted - if one discounts (as I do) the base ball cap. Ineluctably base, if not particularly ballish IMO)

The baseball cap is perhaps the most obvious example of the phenomenon of the wearing of sportswear as leisurewear. This seems to have come in almost on a sliding scale with the disappearance of formal hats and caps. When did teenagers and others in the US begin wearing baseball jackets etc as a fashion statements - the late 1940s or early 1950s? And when did soccer clubs in Europe and South America begin selling replica team shirts as merchandise - the 1970s?

Away from sportswear, when did people first start to wear clothing with writing on? Some people have done so for many decades for purposes of work. For example pictures of crewmen from the Titanic show them wearing pullovers with the words 'White Star Line' embroidered on them. But when did the wearing of lettering begin as a matter of personal choice? For my part I have always refused to act as a free sandwich-board for clothing designers. And often it's not just designers names and logos on clothing. How many people around the world have sported the initials of the University of California, Los Angeles on their person without even being alumni? Then there are political/social etc messages on clothing. I remember being bemused in the mid-1980s by the hoards of people wearing white t-shirts with the words 'Frankie says' printed in big black letters on the front.

Any other examples?

I don't know about baseball caps, Vizzer, but when I was growing up, my father's generation all wore cloth caps (bunnets, in the local vernacular)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flat_cap

Not clothing, but plastic bags. I routinely turn the ones with the names on inside out - I'm not an unpaid sandwich man for Tesda etc.

Triceratops wrote:

I don't know about baseball caps, Vizzer, but when I was growing up, my father's generation all wore cloth caps (bunnets, in the local vernacular)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flat_cap

Triceratops,

mine too, but only later. When young he wore a
http://www.dadshats.com/fedoras.html

I am a little bit surprized to see your flat cap in Britain...I thought it was "continental"...but yes even the Turks wore a flat cap due to Ata Turk...
I was intrigued by your "(bunnets, in the local vernacular)" and thought about the French "bonnet" but normally "a hat" is "un chapeau" in French...
http://www.omniprix.com/chapeau-fedora-homme/zzomniprixzB1z0--recherche-html?nxtg=c240a320d11-B5CCC5631FE8FF0E
and "un bonnet" is:
https://www.google.be/search?q=image+d'un+bonnet&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ei=vCblU9K5GImaygPTxICoAQ&ved=0CB0QsAQ&biw=1200&bih=731

 Kind regards from Paul.

That's it, Trike, but was his a hooker-doon?

ferval wrote:

That's it, Trike, but was his a hooker-doon?

Ferval,

you know my week points (places?)...

Had to find it...
http://www.thefullwiki.org/List_of_headgear

"a cloth cap with a peak in Scotland"...
But on the whole internet no picture...
Have the wildest phantasies about it...

Your friend, Paul.

addendum...of course I meant "weak" instead of "week"...

Vizzer wrote:

The baseball cap is perhaps the most obvious example of the phenomenon of the wearing of sportswear as leisurewear. This seems to have come in almost on a sliding scale with the disappearance of formal hats and caps. When did teenagers and others in the US begin wearing baseball jackets etc as a fashion statements - the late 1940s or early 1950s? And when did soccer clubs in Europe and South America begin selling replica team shirts as merchandise - the 1970s?

Away from sportswear, when did people first start to wear clothing with writing on? Some people have done so for many decades for purposes of work. For example pictures of crewmen from the Titanic show them wearing pullovers with the words 'White Star Line' embroidered on them. But when did the wearing of lettering begin as a matter of personal choice? For my part I have always refused to act as a free sandwich-board for clothing designers. And often it's not just designers names and logos on clothing. How many people around the world have sported the initials of the University of California, Los Angeles on their person without even being alumni? Then there are political/social etc messages on clothing. I remember being bemused in the mid-1980s by the hoards of people wearing white t-shirts with the words 'Frankie says' printed in big black letters on the front.

Any other examples?

Perhaps a bit of a tangent, Vizzer, but back in the day I bought - and wore - a T-shirt with the text, 'No job - No girl - No money - No problem'

I  still have it - somewhere - but it's now almost too thredbare to be worn in public.

Paul, a hooker-doon is a flat cap where the fabric of the crown is pulled forward and attached to the stiff brim by a press stud.

While on the subject of headgear, I came across this explanation of 'ten-gallon' in connection to the archetypal cowboy hat: it seems that it derives from sombreros, the fanciest of which were decorated around the crown with rows of gold braid, in Spanish gallon, and the most expensive and flashiest of these could accommodate ten rows.

Ah thanks for that interesting explanation ferval, I thought the 10 gallon referred to how much water a hat could hold for a thristy horse and cowboy..... 

ferval wrote:

Paul, a hooker-doon is a flat cap where the fabric of the crown is pulled forward and attached to the stiff brim by a press stud.

While on the subject of headgear, I came across this explanation of 'ten-gallon' in connection to the archetypal cowboy hat: it seems that it derives from sombreros, the fanciest of which were decorated around the crown with rows of gold braid, in Spanish gallon, and the most expensive and flashiest of these could accommodate ten rows.

Ferval,

from the reaction of this man I suppose a hooker-doon is that?
https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.631714176862246.1073741835.584319371601727&type=3

I suppose I have seen in the time some flat caps where the fabric of the crown was pulled forward and attached to the stiff brim by a press stud (un pression? een drukknoop?) but that were mostly caps in "imperméable" material against the rain. The ones in cloth (fabric?) were mostly partly sewn together with the stiff brim...

Kind regards, Paul.

ferval wrote:

That's it, Trike, but was his a hooker-doon?

Ferval, I think so though I'm not 100% sure.

.......................................................................

There is a hat museum in an Stockport mill;

http://www.stockport.gov.uk/services/leisureculture/visitstockport/museumsandgalleries/museumsandgalleries/hatworks/

And a BBC article about baseball caps from 10 years ago;

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/3660333.stm

Get out the sewing box ladies (gents too if you're handy with a needle) and run up your own copy of the oldest known woven garment, the Tarkhan dress. Actually it looks more like a blouse to me but it seems that the skirt has worn away.



Found in a first dynasty tomb south of Cairo, it has been confirmed now as dating from between 3482-3102 BC (with 95% accuracy), it was made from a tasteful linen with a natural pale grey stripe. It had knife pleated sleeves and bodice and would be just the thing for lunch with the girls.

The pattern and sewing instructions are here:  http://www.ucl.ac.uk/museums/petrie/about/collections/objects/tarkhan-dress

Really easy to make, it wouldn't take long at all. Although maybe for summer wear.

I was looking at this today and being astounded by the hours and hours of hand work that went into decorating fabric, although this is a long time after your example ferval when sewing techniques were more advanced.

http://www.ancient-origins.net/artifacts-other-artifacts/stitching-story-cutwork-embroidery-one-most-luxurious-goods-europe-005346

The excavation and preservation work have been going on for some time but the exhibition has just opened of the items recovered from a 17th century wreck off the Netherlands. The recovered items include some very well-preserved items of clothing and interestingly it seems fairly certain they belonged to Jean Kerr, Countess of Roxburghe and lady-in-waiting to Charles I's queen, Henrietta Maria. She lost her wardrobe when her ship sank just as she arrived off the Netherlands on a secret mission in 1642.

There's this silk gown:



and this small ornate ladies' bag (an étui):



... plus a cloak, stockings, silk and satin bodices, books (bearing the Stuart crest), bottles of perfume, a comb, a pomander and a silver cup ... as well as more general artifacts from the ship itself.

Popular Archaeology : Royal 17th century wardrobe found in the Wadden Sea

Amazing preservation considering they've all been buried in silt and under the sea for nearly 400 years.

An amazing find. I love the bag!

Here's the lady herself,



Jean Ker(r), Countess of Roxburghe (c.1585-1643).

Along with MM's interesting thread on masks, the fascination with dressing up continues - in fact in all that we we wear we are proclaiming something. Mao had his people in uniforms to try to make the hive more efficient, I wonder if it did? I have yet to meet someone who was not interesting. Even the dullest have reason to be thus and that is enough to set me wondering with interest.  Genetic engineering may change all of that in time. Choosing the prototypes for it might be rather hard; dressing them for it will not, of course. Many more High street closures will follow. Diversity keeps the economy going.

King Edward VII of Great Britain attempted to prevent the demise of the frock coat and to revive the fashion of wearing knee-breeches with evening dress.

If people don't mind a little levity while looking for a video where I could practise my shorthand to the audio, I came across this clip from a costume historian about accuracy in TV and cinema 

Thinking about flat caps, the main character in the long-running Andy Capp comic strip wears one to this day.  I tried to post a link which didn't take but the character can be googled.

Yes, LiR, I suppose, in films the first goal is entertainment and perhaps even more "money making". And in that accuracy and research for it and also the work to make the costumes cost also money...

Kind regards from Paul.

I did some background reading about pleating.  I did a search of the site on the subject and couldn't find anything.  If my background reading is correct the custom of pleating clothes goes back to ancient Egypt - and sometimes the pleats would fall out after washing a garment.  It seems there is one firm in London that commercially pleats cloth though I suppose there are more abroad.  It seems a fairly complicated process, making templates for the cloth to be pleated and pressing and steaming the cloth. 

Deleted - double post.

LiR,

I guessed that pleats were "plooien" in Dutch and I guess "plooirok" will be then be a "pleat skirt"?
In our dialect we say: "plissérok" (half French half Dutch).

My sister had one when she was a child and in the youth organisation (de roodkapjes (the red caps)) and I think also for the school uniform. But I don't remember if it were "accordeon" pleats or others. As there seems to be "pleats" and "pleats"...
https://allesovercosplay.nl/hoe-maak-plooien/

And perhaps is it complicated, but as you can see one can do it at home too:



LiR, forgive me but since the obliged wearing of Covid 19 masks I always look to the eyes, and I find the eyes of the lady a bit expressive, not to say special...if with a mask the attention to her eyes would be even more "impressionant"...? at least in my humble opinion...

Kind regards, Paul.

Of the fashion in masks my impression is that many are worn not to prevent giving the virus but to prevent getting it. Self preservation probably still comes first. 

It is noted that a woman called Megan, wife of one Prince Harry  ex army Captain - wears sandals designed by one Stella McCartney daughter of old pop star Beatle  which are of vegan leather and surely cost a lot. Am I supposed to be impressed by any of that. (What does a vegan cow look like?) (Do not get personal.)

Priscilla wrote:

Of the fashion in masks my impression is that many are worn not to prevent giving the virus but to prevent getting it. Self preservation probably still comes first. 

No - the opposite, I would say. Most people at this stage understand quite well that normal masks prevent one's breath, when exhaling, from spreading a potential viral load in aerosol form and not that they will necessarily prevent inhalation of viruses should they attach to airborne particles small enough to pass through the material.

Of course when I say "most people" I'm omitting the idiots, so maybe you have a point after all. However it still must be said that the logic of wearing a mask does not preclude self-preservation - just not quite in the way that an idiot might presume.

Aren't all cows vegan, by the way? Or at least those not forced to eat their relatives in mulch form.

My experience of most people is whatever the stated aim avoiding the virus is to the fore..... hand cleansing is not as generally followed as one ought expect but possibly fewer noses are picked.

if all cows are vegan then their leather ought be called vegan, yes. This being a side effect of getting minced and into a burger bun. Vegan   leather  sounds meat free - if boiled long enough possibly also makes a vegan burger....... my mother used to say of such people   poor burgers ... or something similar.

The Duchess' outfit itemised here:

What To Wear When You Meet Gloria Steinem

This week, Megan climbed into a pair of £200 trousers teamed with £500 vegan leather sandals and topped off with a £300 straw sun hat to usher 86-year-old feminist icon Gloria Steinem into a deckchair and have a simple ol' 'backyard chat'.



God forgive me for:

(1) Reading the Mail online;

(2) Chortling with delight over the bitchiness of Jan Moir's article;

(3) Wishing HRH Prince Harry of Wales had never set eyes on Ms Markle.


PS No face masks, even for the at-risk ancient feminist! You can buy a lovely Christian Dior mask - pretty scrap of material, plus bit of elastic - for around £300. There are also posh hand sanitisers to fish out of your handbag: a snippet in last week's Sunday Times magazine details five such,including one called Haoma (how do you pronounce that?), £16, for "a natural antibacterial spray made from sugarcane ethanol". Does it zap exotic new viruses as well as boring old bacteria? Or would the Covid19 bug actually like any sugarcane bits? Feed a cold and starve a fever comes to mind! I got a gel for £3.99 from Morrisons. It's lasted ages and it kills 99.9 % of anything.

99% of sugarcane ethanol is currently being produced in Brazil, where it is still very much in development as an industry hoping to capitalise on an increasing global reliance on biomass fuels. At this stage it's still therefore very expensive, with even more expense piled on top when one factors in transport costs. If one also factors in the cost to the environment of the same transport logistics then I think any reasonable person with even a slight understanding of economics, chemistry and climate change should find at least three good reasons not to fork out extraordinarily high levels of dosh on this product (Brazilians might reduce this to two reasons). But then the product obviously isn't being aimed at the intelligent thrifty person anyway ...

Ethanol, even if expensively produced, actually has a poor record against viruses. It will break down the viruses' protein layers if applied for about ten times longer than ordinary soap used per standard instructions (20 seconds vigorous washing). However if used as a gel you can avoid the vigorous bit as long as the application remains moist for about two minutes on the skin.

There was a time - in my lifetime - when one did not got out without the right gloves to match an outfit.

This was partly to avoid touching not only to avoid grubby paws but to avoid   flesh to flesh exciting grubby minds. 

The quality of gloves worn was remarked, as I recall and certainly to impress. Even if the coat was old the gloves had to be impeccable. 

We may see a glove trend emerging - unless the damn  virus mines thrive on them.

Unless the fashion is for disposable gloves then any glove fashion inspired by a viral pandemic is bound to exacerbate the issue,  not alleviate it.

Then textiles  seriously harbour viruses? At least gloved hands do not touch the face as much. A sad thought that we may  lose gloves as a fashion statement - or indefinably   for warmth too if they are a risk. 

Throwing a disposable latex glove also seems less challenging than a gauntlet. The times they are a changing.

I read something about the colour green having been considered unlucky among the trawler folk of Hull as a colour for ganseys which are a type of fishermen's sweater I believe.  The lady who wrote the article thought the superstition might arise from green being a colour associated with creation in folklore sometimes.  An unfortunate clergyman who used green for the painting the pews of the church in Hull where he had the living in the 1920s suffered the ignominy of being pelted with eggs and rotting cod among other things at a garden party.  The local folk didn't appreciate his insensitivity to the area's avoidance of green.

I hadn't heard of this superstition before.  Does anyone know if it is (or was) particular to Hull or if it applies to the east coast generally?  

If anyone would like to read the original information, it can be found on the blog theknittinggenie.com in an article dated 4th June 2020.

By no means confined to Hull, LiR. Antipathy among fisherfolk to green is found across Northern Europe and, from there, made it into the Americas too.

Here in Norway the root of this superstition is put down to when boats were made exclusively of wood or stretched hides, and I am sure the same applies everywhere else it took hold too. The last thing you want to see on a wooden hull are the green tell-tale patches of mould that indicate your vessel is rotting from within. Painting your boat green is therefore not just unlucky, but plain stupid as it makes it so much harder to spot this early and hopefully address it.

In Ireland the antipathy is explained rather more gruesomely, green being the skin colour of recently drowned people, recovery of whom was a depressingly regular experience for those whose work kept them out to sea for long stretches.

Wearing green clothes simply followed on from this general aversion as equally dodgy a practise, almost as if one was intentionally taunting fate.

"Gansey", by the way (in Irish "Geansaí" and Norwegian "Genser", the official word for jumper/pullover/sweater in both toungues) is down to the Norwegians and Danes too, and they in turn owe it to their time raiding the Frankish kingdoms. It began when the highly practical Scandinavians noticed mid-pillage and rape that their victims in Guernsey wore, in the very old Gaul style, a thick woolen upper garment, close knit, warm and pretty waterproof. Just the ticket in fact for enterprising Vikings who could look forward to many days and nights exposed to the elements on long voyages. They adopted it immediately and soon were introducing their newly acquired sartorial embellishment to many more victims around western Europe, along with the word of course.

Some places in England have preserved far more loan-words from Norse than elsewhere, Hull included.

In my family, green cars are regarded as unlucky. Certainly I've had two considerable accidents in green cars.
There is, of course, the theory that Napoleon's death was caused by Sheele's Green pigment in the wallpaper leaking arsenic when damp.

Green as a colour was often associated with the world of Fae and faeries generally, not just Irish leprechauns. To wear green, especially at important ostentatious occasions, risked attracting the negative attention of the wee folk who saw wearing green as their prerogative and accordingly wearing green to weddings or funerals was generally considered to be tempting fate. At weddings, especially if worn by the bride or bridesmaids (and remember white weddings only became the fashion in the mid 19th century) it might provoke the fairies' jealousy of mortal true love and so the happy couple risked their first-born being taken away and replaced by a fairy changling. If worn at a funeral it was thought that wearing green presaged black, ie that person would soon have to wear black to a funeral of a loved one.

There is I think, if memory serves, an old English rhyme that says: 'married in green, ashamed to be seen'. I don't know but I suspect the wearing of green was often taken to imply, whether rightly or wrongly, that the bride was already pregnant but that the couple's first born might not be the groom's child ... probably not a fairy changeling but the child might well not look like his mother's new husband.

Green as a colour certainly has a long association with the sin of jealousy, hence Shakespeare's "green-eyed monster".

I've always been partial to the colour green but the information imparted here does explain why people might have avoided it, especially with regard to painting a boat.  One of my cousins and her husband and their adult children live in Hull.  My cousin met her husband at university there though they have also lived elsewhere but I'd never discussed green being an unlucky colour with them.  We tend to just exchange Xmas cards these days.