Occasionally, I create a paper doll outfit and I know I want to continue for another outfit in another style. For this paper doll set, I wanted to take this Viking Woman Warrior inspired outfit from last January and create a whole Viking fantasy paper doll collection around it. The original design was inspired by this drawing, but I didn’t look at it until I was finished with these new designs.
Today’s paper doll outfits were based on Viking clothing, such as apron-dresses, but I also just had fun with the motifs on the first tunic inspiring motifs on the other pieces.
The paper doll’s hair was pretty much inspired by stereotypes of Viking hair. I wanted it to feel fantasy, but not be overly elaborate. Actual Vikings were very into personal grooming and took care of their appearance. We know this from the number of combs, tweezers and other tools found in the graves of Vikings. This is Viking fantasy, but I object to the whole idea that they were scruffy.
I did a lot of research on Vikings a few years ago back in 2015 and wrote up a quick over view if you want to read about actual Viking dress. I really enjoyed learning when I did that research. Though I openly confess that I don’t really go with historical Vikings very often. I know enough to know I don’t know enough.
But since I love playing around with different historical periods and creating fantasy paper dolls based on them, I don’t feel too worried about the historical accuracy here.
Meanwhile, if you’re a fan of the blog, than consider joining us over on Patreon. There’s ever more paper doll content. And who doesn’t want more paper dolls?
Thoughts on Today’s Paper Doll On some level, I draw the sorts of paper dolls I wanted as a child. I wanted hundreds of outfits. I didn’t want 100s of dolls, but one doll with a huge wardrobe. Well, now a days I also recognize the importance of doll variety (being that I am no longer 12) and I have too much fun drawing different dolls to just have one.
Beyond all that, I draw things that I feel like drawing. This isn’t great for the sites stats, but it does make me happy. Sometimes, that means I draw a Viking woman warrior in the form of a paper doll outfit. I firmly believe anything can become paper doll clothing. (Not anything SHOULD become paper doll clothing, but that’s a whole different issue, you know?)
Now, I admit things get a little random around here. This week they certainly will, but I hope everyone has as much fun as I do with the random.
Inspiration for Today’s Paper Doll In my head, I sort of organize my fantasy paper dolls in to several categories based on their general aesthetic. There’s Asia inspired or Renaissance inspired or Russia inspired. Today’s set was Viking inspired, but I mean… it’s a fantasy outfit, but it feels Viking to me.
Specific Source Images:This Viking Woman Warrior which I found on Pinterest and couldn’t find a source for, sadly. It’s lovely digital art. Let me know if you know the artist.
Last Thoughts Today’s Viking inspired fantasy outfit will be followed by some professional wear tomorrow. See, I said this week would be random.
This week’s random collection would have gone up last week, but cybergoth won the poll I gave those who support me on Patreon. If you want some input into those things, you can join us there.
Now, I know I will always sometimes have random weeks, because I don’t always want to draw a bunch of the same thing, but I am curious. Do you prefer weeks with themes or weeks of random? I feel a little divided. I think theme weeks are great if you like the theme, but maybe little dull if you happen to hate cybergoth or something. What do you think? Let me know in a comment.
The truth is that while I enjoy drawing historical paper doll clothing, there’s always some pressure there. I want things to be accurate (to the best of my ability) and well cited.
So, sometimes I just want to draw something that is inspired by a period of time without feeling like I need to do track down a source to justify my decision. This was one of those times. I just wanted to drawn an apron-dress.
I didn’t want to mess around with trying to decide of dwarf brooches were worn by unmarried women and how long the dress was based on fragments of braid found in graves.
I mean, that’s all fascinating stuff, but… sometimes I just want to draw a worm ouroboros and be done with it. That’s the symbol on her apron. It’s a serpent biting its own tail and it shows up all over the world.
In Norse mythology (for those of you who weren’t obsessed with the ouroboros in high school), the serpent Jörmungandr encircles the earth, biting its own tail forming an ouroboros. Ragnarok (the end of the world) will begin when Jörmungandr lets go of its tail. Thor, the God of Thunder, will fight Jörmungandr, slay it and then die from the poison of the serpent.
Anyway, along with her apron-dress, she has a pair of fur wrapped boots, a knife, cup and comb.
This dress went through several different color schemes. This color scheme was my second one. My first attempt was yellow, reds and greens and I just didn’t like it as much as this blue and yellow version. I did toss up on my Patreon page. Head over there to download and print it, if you want a second color scheme for today’s dress or to build more of a fantasy viking wardrobe. While you’re there, think about joining to help keep the blog on the internets. It really does help offset my costs.
Today’s Printable Paper Doll Inspirations: Vikings… Kinda, But Not Really That Much
I am not a big Viking fan-girl. There are people out there who are just obsessed with Vikings and, mostly, I respect that. I’ve done my fair share of Viking research and drawn Viking women’s garments based on that research (read that here). You can check out those historical Viking paper doll outfits over here.
And I am here to say that this paper doll ain’t that. Vikings inspired today’s warrior paper doll outfit to have the same accuracy as a Wagner opera about vikings. In other words, not a whole lot of that.
Rather than accuracy, I wanted to draw fur and fantasy armor. Not practical fantasy armor, but absurd fantasy armor. Made more absurd, because this armor wouldn’t keep you warm in the cold northern climate anyway.
There is fur there, but it is pretty decorative rather than actually practical. Still, I had a bunch of fun drawing it. It was a hoot to create.
I am happy to create things that are just fun and not really realistic or practical.
Want to see more Viking paper doll stuff? There’s a whole category called, “Viking inspired.”
Want to donate and support the blog? Join Patreon! It’s a fun place and the support really helps keep things running around here.
Now, I’ve done a historical viking paper doll before for the B&B paper doll series and I suspect I’ll do one again, but that is not happening today. Today, I decided to play with viking clothing in an entirely fantasy realm.
I tend to do my laundry in the evenings. I never seem to remember to start it before I go to work, so I am writing this post to the rhythmic noise of the washer cleaning clothing for tomorrow and the dryer doing the same.
The truth is that I designed these outfits so long ago, that I don’t really know what to say about them and listening to my washer is not very inspiring on the blog post writing front.
I guess what I’ll say is this: One of the most interesting things about doing the Sprites is getting to think about what to draw for a boy and then what to draw for a girl. That’s also one of the more challenging aspects of the process. These two outfits are really tied together more by their color scheme than by their design motifs.
So, today we have Maiden of the North in color. Originally, I was used going to use any neutrals, but I realized that wasn’t really working out part way though coloring and changed my mind. I reserve the right to change my mind about just about anything.
Paper doll hair colors are usually picked based on what I think will look good with the set or on what I think I haven’t done in a while. I try to have a wide diversity of paper doll hair colors, skin tones and other things, so if I feel like I’ve done a lot of red-heads or blonds lately, than I’ll often do something else.
Otherwise, I think every paper doll would have red-hair.
For those of you who missed last week’s post, the costumes are largely inspired by Viking dress with a fair amount of fantasy elements. The oval or dwarf brooches at the shoulders are the distinctly Viking element. I have discovered a strange affection for dwarf brooches.
So, if you happen to see some weird pharmacy stuff on the site, don’t worry. I mean, it is a problem, but I’m working on fixing it. Hopefully, it won’t effect anyone at the moment. It’s bad code that needs to be cleaned up manually left over from a hack. Annoying, but part of website ownership. Thanks for your patience while I deal with it.
And if you like my paper doll (and want to see Marisole Monday & Friends before Monday), please consider supporting me through Patreon.
Vikings… Vikings… Vikings… Okay, not really. I mean, these are totally fantasy Viking outfits, but I have had Vikings on the mind ever since I did my historically accurate (for the given value of accurate) Viking paper doll and I found myself returning to the Viking look.
So, what makes these Viking inspired or Norse inspired, as I tend to call it. Well, the big thing are those dwarf-brooches. You can read all about the actual drawf brooches in my Viking article, but I wanted to include them here. Her shoes are also based on actual Viking finds in York, so they’re also a nod to the whole Norse/Viking thing.
I added fur trim to her gowns and did a lot of pattern. I wanted to get to use multiple colors in these gowns, so the patterns help with that.
Our model today is Meaghan of the Marisole Monday & Friend’s family. This is the fifth Meaghan set and probably the last one of the year. I’m getting to that point where I start planning for 2016. Thinking about 2016 and making sure I have enough backlog to get me through the Holidays. I always travel mid-December to visit family, so I tend to try to have things ready before I depart.
That means… backlog, backlog, backlog!
(It helps if you say it three times in an increasingly cheery voice. That’s how the backlog fairies know you really need their help.)
As always, I love to hear for you guys, so feel free to ask questions or leave thoughts in the comments.
In truth, we know very little about what Viking women wore, so that makes drawing a Viking paper doll sorta exciting (and scary). Unlike the 10th century Anglo-Saxons, the Vikings did not have a manuscript culture. Their art was generally metal work or stone carving and highly stylized. Making things more rather than less complicated, textiles rot extremely quickly in soil and those which remain in tact are often saved by their proximity to other materials such as metal, while metal breaks down it releases salts that protect the textile.
This means that what remains we have of Viking garments are fragmentary at best. While working on my Viking paper doll, I did my research, as always, and then made decisions based on my understanding of Viking garments. My understanding isn’t perfect. I am not an archaeologist, nor do I study Viking cultures extensively. My post Wednesday, Viking Women’s Dress in the 10th Century  covers my sources and what I understand about Viking garments.
Though I came away from my research with the conclusion that there is more supposition than certainty in Viking dress research, I couldn’t be more pleased by how my printable paper doll came out. Her two apron-dresses or smokkrs over shirts were both designed based on the work of some excellent scholars. I chose a closed smokkr, because I agree with Ewing’s and Geijer’s views on the shape of the smokkr. I added an apron on one, based on the work of Bau and Ewing. To the other, I added pleats based on the reconstruction of a smokkr by Hilde Thunem. She has a key, a cup, a comb and a small knife. From the brooches on her left smokkr hang a pair of scissors, a small knife and a needle case.
Her shoes are based on finds at Viking York and her stockings and garters are based on the work of Ewing who argues that Viking men wore garters. I have no reason to believe if men were wearing them than women weren’t. Besides, Scandinavia is rather chilly to be wandering around bare legged.
When selecting colors, I tried to be aware of what colors were known to be used by Vikings. There were several references to brown twills in the articles I read (sources here) and the Kostup find is known to have been blue. Her brown smokkr, or apron-dress, has different colored straps, because linen loops were sometimes used on wool smokkrs. Linen, unlike wool, doesn’t take dye very well. I wanted to make a nod to that practice. Both the serks or shirts, I left undyed in lighter colors. One shirt is pleated, as is found in many Birka graves, and one is unpleated. The paper doll has a hair covering as referenced in Ewing’s book, Viking Clothing.
I made my Viking paper doll blond really only because when I think of Vikings, I think of blonds. Perhaps an unfair assumption, but there you go.
As with my Anglo-Saxon paper doll of the same century, I strongly recommend reading my little article and then reading my sources. I would also caution that most of the research on Vikings is not published in English. Until more of the articles are translated into English, I did the best I could with what sources were readily available.
I know people have been waiting on this printable paper doll, so I hope the wait was worth it. I certainly am nothing but pleased with how she came out.
As always, if you like the paper dolls and want to support the blog than check out my Patreon. 🙂
As I mentioned a while ago, my computer died while I was traveling to visit family in Alaska. I’m pleased to report it is working fine now and it just cost money. Also, I should really back up my data more often, because hard drive problems suck.
Anyway, let’s talk about nicer things like paper dolls.
One of the reasons I keep a backlog of paper dolls is that should disaster strike, I have some things to post. I confess that my backlog has gotten lower these last few weeks and this has been a rough week for finding time to do blog work. Five hour power outage, jet lag, computer problems… Yeesh.
So, here is Greta and she is going out hunting. I didn’t give her any arrows, but…. err…. No excuse for that one, actually. I just kinda forgot. Maybe she can garrote things with her bow string or something. The image of paper dolls garroting small fuzzy woodland creatures in order to make them into stew is now going to haunt me.
Other news… Assuming I get my act together, there should be a Marcus paper doll on Monday and then some other stuff in the coming weeks. I am trying to get excited, but I am struggling to feel inspired at the moment. I’m sure it’ll come back. It always does eventually.
How do other people deal with lulls in inspiration?
Clearly, I’ve been on a bit of a medieval kick with Monday’s 14th century set and today’s psuedo-medieval Poppet paper doll set. Ironically, I’m not that much of a medieval fantasy fan. As far as book genres, I’m much more into urban fantasy than anything in the classic or epic fantasy genres.
Of course, urban fantasy generally doesn’t lend to crazy paper doll outfit sets.
This set is partly because of my goal this year to make  more Poppet paper doll sets. Last year, I only did eight Poppet sets which seems rather like a low number. This year my goal is at least ten. I also really want to do some historical clothing sets for them, since I have an absurd love of Victorian children’s clothing. Those sets, however, aren’t even drawn yet. I think I should finish some of my unfinished Poppet paper doll clothes before I start drawing more of them.
I have a lot of unfinished Poppet sets lurking accusingly on my computer and demanding completion.
Today’s paper doll set features colors in the same family as my Marcus the Warrior paper doll. I almost gave them real swords, but that seemed like a terribly dangerous thing to give a small child, so a wooden sword would have to do. I really do enjoy drawing toys as accessories for the Poppets.
Meanwhile, I have been giving a lot of thought to Copyright and other issues of posting content on the internet. Would people be interested on a post on that topic?
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