Folk costumes

Folk costume is like a book on which you can read the history of the peoples of the world, traditions, rituals. And although even in ancient times fashion had its own tendencies, changing tastes and preferences, nevertheless the main distinctive features of women's and men's costumes remained unchanged. Moreover, in different areas of a country, national clothes differed according to local weather conditions, lifestyle and traditions, but all the options had similarities. Let's see what folk costumes in Russia were like.

Russian folk costumes

On all territory of Kievan Rus men's folk costume was the same - both children and boys in the warm season were wearing a long shirt with a belt. Under the back was a cloth patch, called a backdrop, to the left a cut was made on the neck, often laced with braid. Also, a beautiful embroidered braid over the edges of the sleeves and the hem of the shirt.

The wedding shirt was different from everyday with a thin soft cloth of pure white color, the edges were embroidered with wide bright embroidery.

Men also wore pants, often sewn from a coarse blue linen cloth with a thin white stripe. The length of the pants was up to the knees, because they often refueled in high boots. A traditional headdress was a hat with furred wool or dense cloth.

Women's suits were different in every province - if in the South-Russian regions women wore a shirt, skirt and ponevu, resembling the Ukrainian and Belarusian traditional clothes, then in Yaroslavl, for example, national women's clothing was a sundress with a warm quilted jacket with long sleeves.

In general terms, the everyday female costume can be characterized as follows:

1. Sarafan. In fact, in those days the sarafan was nothing but a long and high skirt on the straps. However, over time, clothes began to transform, decorative elements such as buttons, ties, fringes and various edges were added. For sewing folk sarafans originally used fabrics, made with their own hands, but with the advent of weaving in the late 18th century, thin and beautiful sarafan fabrics, painted with bouquets and various floral motifs, came into fashion.
2. Shirt. The Slavic shirt was an inalienable attribute of both everyday and festive women's folk costume. They sewed such clothes from thin linen or hemp cloth. The shirts under the sarafan were made from a perfectly white fabric, under the skirt the embroidery was sewn on it or the braid was sewn on the sleeves, the neck and hem were cut out.
3. Poneva. Ponewa can be called a long woolen skirt of a dark blue color or checkered colors worn by married women in Russia. The skirt of such a skirt was richly decorated with beautiful braid or embroidery.

Depending on the age of the woman, the ponya was changing - both her appearance and color changed.

Folk costume and modern fashion

Hardly anyone will argue with folk wisdom, stating that everything new is a well-forgotten old. The same can be said about the modern fashion, drawing its ideas from the clothes of the past, did not become exceptions and folk costumes.

In modern fashion, such attributes of the Russian folk costume as an embroidered shirt, a long woolen skirt in a cage or bright light sundresses with floral prints are increasingly found. But, of course, the styles of clothing have changed beyond recognition - folk shirts have become exquisite blouses or stylish tunics, skirts, in the old days, are broad and bulky, in today's fashion are sewn on the figure, perfectly emphasizing the delicate waist and the shape of the woman's thighs.