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I think a lot of us have found that one of the benefits of working from home is that we can wear more casual and comfortable clothing. I've worked from home for a long time, and my normal wear is jeans, t-shirt and hoodie. It’s comfortable and practical, and it’s an outfit that can be dressed up or down, depending on your choices and personal style.
When I was developing the world of the Choices and Consequences series, I thought about clothing. It needed to be practical for both physical and sedentary work, and for travel, which is at a far more mediaeval level than our own world. I wanted it to be comfortable and broadly unisex, at least for everyday wear and it would need to be reasonably economical – my world has limited resources. So I settled on something that is basically jeans, t-shirt and hoodie. But there’s a lot of variety, based on colour, or fabric, or fit.
For the monks and nuns the trousers are straight cut in soft brown cotton. The t-shirt is white, with either long or short sleeves, depending on weather and circumstances. The hoodie is hip length, brown with either long, or no sleeves.
For everyone else, there’s much more variety. Women tend to choose softer fabrics, brighter colours, and more close fitting designs often with a longer hoodie and more decoration but there’s no hard and fast rule about it. In hot weather, many will wear shorts and a short sleeved t- shirt with no hoodie, or women might wear a short sleeved dress (slight gender bias there because I like summer dresses).
For formal wear, the colour, embellishment and material will tend to be fancier and will often indicate the House the wearer belongs to. Each House has its own logo, and this will form part of the decoration on formal wear. Thread of Hope introduces House Tennant, where the signature colour is green, and the logo is a stylised castle with little castellations. Tennant’s the birth House of Prospero (Perry). In this extract towards the end of Strand of Faith, Brother Edward knows that...and Leonie doesn’t.
Edward had brought me yet another new outfit and again he seemed to have woven some magic into it. This one was a shimmering emerald green silk which made my hair look redder than ever. There was no undershirt, just a short-sleeved tunic which fitted closely to my hips and then flared out, worn with matching leggings and ankle boots. The embroidery at the neck and hem line was in silver, little castellations like a picture book castle, interspersed with the cross keys of House St Peter. I found I was eagerly looking forward to wearing it, to Perry seeing me in it.
My hair was longer now, though still very curly, and Lady Eleanor came and styled it for me. She insisted I wore my necklace and bracelet too, even if the jewels weren't the same colour as the dress. I looked in the mirror when she was done and thought I looked almost as grand, as beautiful as any of the ladies I'd seen at other Houses.
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