Coronation of Abran & Anya

Kingdom of Atlantia - 10/1/2022

I was honored and delighted to be asked to create the Coronation clothing for Their Majesties Abran and Anya of Atlantia. My own persona is Spanish, and I have wanted the opportunity to work within a Spanish reign for many years, so when They announced Their intention to have a 14th century Iberian-themed reign, I immediately reached out with an offer to sew.

This couple was such a joy to work with, and the final result exactly hit the vision I had in mind for Them.

The Inspirations

Anya loves the image on the far left - she picked it out immediately from the images I posted to a shared Pinterest board. The best part is that it’s already in the colors they chose, so I knew I could match Abran’s garments to it by just inverting the color scheme (red and blue).

As the process unfolded, the design was tweaked around - we decided to use the triple spot design on the second photo to decorate the outer gown. It’s a common motif in European gothic clothing, and a nice bit of continuity with Their Pennsic garb. We also added gold touches to fancy the fairly simple designs up a bit. Anya agreed to let me put the little flared cuff on as seen in the third and forth images, and I agreed to put a ton of fancy gold buttons down both arms.

She also requested that everything be well-fitted, but not so tight that she can’t pick up her son (who is three), and that the bulk of the material be linen so it’s fairly easy to clean. My goal was to make her look and feel like a beautiful Princess (and Queen).

Sources L to R:

  1. Detail: Altarpiece of Saint Stephen, c.1385, by Jaume Serra (active in Barcelona 1358-1389/1395). Museu Nacional d'Art de Catalunya, Barcelona, Spain.

  2. Detail from a mudejar beam: 1390. Location unknown.

  3. Detail from a mudejar beam: 1390. Location unknown.

  4. Detail: 1370-80. Jaime Serra, Altarpiece of the Virgin of the Monastery of Sigena, Museu Nacional d'Art de Catalunya, Barcelona

Abran also requested that his clothes be comfortable enough to get on the floor with his son, but still have a royal feel. “Casual elegance” became the guiding principle for his clothes.

The image on the left was the primary inspiration. However, I didn’t want to pile him with layers, since generally the first weekend of October in Virginia can be quite warm (we weren’t expecting Hurricane Ian at that point!), so I worked on simplifying the shapes.

The image to the right was used to pattern out a plain undertunic, and then I combined the red cote and blue sleeves in the left image to create a single long cote with hanging sleeves.

Sources L to R:

  1. Detail. Las Tablas de San Millán. circa 1390-1410 From the Monastery of San Millán de Suso. Museo de la Rioja, Logroño, Spain.

  2. Detail. Horn player. Ceiling of Teruel Cathedral c. 1335

Construction Details

Anya’s undergown is made of brick red 5.3 oz linen from Fabrics-store.com. The torso is lined with a tightly-woven white linen-cotton blend for support and stability, while the skirts and sleeves are unlined. The bottom hem is wrapped in an eight inch deep panel of patterned silk damask hand applied by Mariana Ruiz de Medina.

The sleeves are cut on the bias (for a little stretch) with attached bell cuffs lined in patterned silk damask. There are 12 gold filigree buttons on each sleeve closure, and instead of buttonholes, Mariana used gold cord to cover the seam of the wrist and created button loops.

The blue linen is a deep navy 5.4 oz linen from Nick of Time Textiles. The fabirc was pretreated by soaking in a lukewarm bath for 5 hours, then washing on cold and hanging to dry. The end result is a fabric that is visibly and tactilely different from the rest of the linen used, which needed very little ironing and retained the original hand.

The pieces of the blue overgown were cut out, and the spot design was hand stamped using the round sponge brushes hot glued together, with a smaller touch up brush. The paint we used was PPG Paints Metallic Latex Interior paint in Gold Metallic base. The torso of the gown was lined in blue linen, and was constructed to pull over the head. The hem of the overgown is short enough to show the silk hem of the undergown.

The sleeves of the overgown were the first minor problem of the project - I was marvelously clever and used the trimmed off portion of the body gores to cut the short sleeves. However, I forgot that patterned fabric for sleeves needs to be cut mirrored…and ended up with two left sleeves and no more painted fabric less than 24 hours before the event. The sleeves are plain blue as a result. The upside is that I was then able to cut these sleeves on the bias as well, and not have to worry about the layers binding up.

Abran’s undertunic is a simple navy blue linen tunic, cut slightly fuller through the body and arms so it will transition well into his regular wardrobe. Ollamh Lanea used the inspiration pictures I provided, and picked up this sewing task when I ran out of hours in the day to finish everything. We opted for a simple round neckline faced with gold silk, and the only real adjust that should be made is to shorten the arms slightly (we didn’t have access to His Majesty during the final construction, so went for longer just to be safe).

His overtunic is the same brick red linen as Anya’s undergown, with a slightly curving V neckline bound in patterned silk damask. The tunic has one wide gore at each side seam that extends to become part of the armhole, thus increasing the volume of the armscye for better movement. I bound the armholes with more silk to up the fancy factor a bit more.

The hanging sleeves are loosely based on the inspiration images, except that I left the “wrist” hems open to show off the silk lining. The result is, I think, a comfortable, elegant garment with the perfect amount of shine for His status.

Side view of each garment during court. Here you can see all the tiny buttons on Anya’s gown, and the balanced drape of Abran’s hanging sleeve.

This photo was from the end of the day, and I’m pleased that after wearing these garments for 8-ish hours, they still looked fresh and tidy.