in HEMA (aka historical european fencing), much of the sport is done with fencing masks on, so identifying your clubmates during sparring or tourneys is just based on gear. you know, what color their jacket and pants are, what patches they have on it, how is their mask painted. If someone borrows someone else’s jacket it’s legitimately jarring, like having someone with an entirely different body type and way of moving stealing your friend’s face.
Once i read about historical fishermen in the north sea and how they each had a specific hat pattern that their buddies would use to identity them while they were bundled up. It was so much part of their identity that they were often buried wearing those hats. The gear is like your name, a visual identifier of YOU when you do not have a face.
anyway, back when I was buying gear i got my pants in ELECTRIC blue. I figured i was gonna get a black or grey jacket. but HEMA gear is kind of expensive because it’s all custom- or handmade, so instead of spending $400 on a new jacket I picked up one secondhand for like 20. Except the only jacket that fit me was bright, SCARLET red. And I already had my expensive, new, custom, BLUE pants. I look like a damn rocket pop or like, a mixed Icee. I was like, shit! I should switch my jacket before i become the rocket pop guy!!!
Long story short, not only am I now the rocket pop guy, the color scheme has bled into my entire wardrobe. Every-fucking-thing I own is red and blue. I look like a french revolutionary. I look like a founding father in a school play. I have become a northern fisherman in my stripey hat. Now, even if I DO get a new jacket, I feel like I GOTTA buy it in red, yk? Otherwise they won’t recognize me. Maybe I won’t recognize me. I’m the rocket pop guy!!!
OP I DO HEMA TOO AND SEEING THIS ON MY DASH FILLED ME WITH SO MUCH EXCITEMENT OMG AND I HAVE SOMETHING RELATED TO SHARE (also if you wanna compare where we get stuff from hit me up)
when I was buying my gambeson, I decided to check out the deal of the day section and found one that was my perfect size for much cheaper
except
it’s description said it was blue and yellow and came with an “added patch”
I initially thought it was going to be more muted colors and I could just sorta subtly be supporting my local basketball team’s colors. When it shipped I realized it was very bright blue and yellow. so now I’m very boldly supporting my local basketball team. Go golden state warriors!!
the added patch turned out to not to be the Warriors’s logo, a dragon, another hema place, or anything else I expected to be. it turned out to be a name tag. a name tag that says JEREMY on it. my name is not Jeremy. the people at my club know this. so for me, someone not named Jeremy, who has never in their life supported a basketball team before, to show up in a bright blue and yellow gambeson emboldened with the name JEREMY on it, was a sight. Jeremy has now become his own identity that I simply use on occasion. I would say he has since become a bit of an icon in our group.
if I’m getting hema pants, they must continue the trend. I am Jeremy
I do SCA (Society for Creative Anachronism) fight, not HEMA, but we’re all wearing helmets and we can’t see faces unless we’re right on top of each other, so the whole ‘I know that is My Good Buddy Joe because he’s wearing My Good Buddy Joe’s armor’ is legit. And then you have my household, where we all wear the exact same armor because it’s household-issue and Free, so the only way to tell us apart is that we write our names on the back of our helmets. If you’re not behind us, good luck.
SCA here, (i did do HEMA for a bit! I can’t fight now) and yes, the Armor and people’s Arms, that is their colors and device on their shield and clothes? Same deal. Even as onlookers we check for where our buddies are by trying to spot their heraldry. My own involves red and blue because that’s like half my real life wardrobe- it’s very much Me.
So you get, “Dude I know that’s our pal Gilbert De Fancy because look at him he’s got a white bend across vivid blue I can see him from two miles away. And that over there is the Monarch because they are wearing the Monarch’s Kingdom-heraldry, and only a King, Queen or Ruler is allowed to wear that and also look how shiny their crown detail on their helm is.”
It’s like in college when you know everyone by their Winter Coat. You each have just one, and you see people’s bundled silhouette before anything else… so “Long black faux-wool buttoned coat with turned cuffs and heavy hood’ becomes who you Are for five months.