Colors Fit For A King

Let’s be honest, arming and equipping a small medieval army is not easy. They don’t sell broadswords at Walmart and searching “fully trained warhorse” yields no results on Amazon. Luckily, I had at least one place to start, BIKING RED.

When you set out to make a short film about the rise of perhaps the most legendary king of all time, you have to make the man look impressive, and it only took about 200 yards of linen to do it. While I am generally a  big fan of wonderfully muted earth-tones, Arthur Pendragon needed to stand out. So a few bolts of BIKING RED later, Surcoats, cloaks and other little details (notice that braid on his helmet?). The once and future king was garbed for war.

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When dealing with a legend such as this, part history, part fantasy and part our own creation, we knew that our costume design would play a key role identifying our characters. I mean, how many times have we seen King Arthur on screen, in the pages of books or in classic art? We used legendary illustrator N.C. Wyeth’s century-old illustrations as a starting point for our own look, and the most prominent aspect of Wyeth’s paintings? Arthur’s red surcoat.

But far more goes in to a film’s look than the design of the titular role! We also introduced a group of Nubian mercenaries in this our second instalment of the story. I privately confess that a large motivation for adding characters from another continent was I wanted to use the new JACQUARD patterns!

The texture on the reversible GOLDEN WHEAT is also possibly my new favorite thing. It gave amazing definition to the garments as well as providing a very different look to what the European characters were wearing. We also experimented with sheer VINTAGE INDIGO for our Nubian head wraps and scarves. It looked amazing and the actors absolutely loved wearing it for its light weight and breathability. 

There were so many other characters to design too! And yes, I got to revel in my favorite muted earth-tones! CAROB and Olive Branch along with POTTING SOIL and GINGER garbed the English archers and men-at-arms.

While other knights like Gawain and Tristan were set apart by brighter colors like DULSE and MALACHITE. 

The bad guys, Basque raiders in this case, wore a variety of grays including GRAPHITE, and MONUMENT with AUTUMN GOLD for accent. 

With that settled, all we had to do was choreograph a cavalry charge, forge new swords, and find a location that looked like Spanish mountains in winter all while hoping not to die of the plague. You know, normal stuff.

Many thanks to Fabrics-Store for helping make this project possible. Nothing makes a good medieval costume like linen!

Costumes created by Fell & Fair Productions.

This adventure isn’t just timeless, it’s for all ages and perfect to share with family, friends and anyone who wants to let their imagination run free.

Do you think these colors worked? What other stories could we tell? Let us know what you think, your feedback helps us deliver the content you most want to see from us. Thank You for adventuring with us.