Traditional German Clothing

Introduction

If there’s one thing you need to do in order to experience the real Bavarian experience in Germany then it’s trying out their traditional cultural dressing. Cultural and heritage events are the best places foreigners can try this out. Their cultural dressing consists of German dirndl for women and lederhosen for men.

Dirndl

The German dirndl originated from dresses worn by the royals and nobility servants in Austria during the 19th Century. In the late 19th Century, the outfit came to be respected as a fashionable dress when the bourgeois decided to wear it. It was not an economic dress to replicate or create but now you can find it in many different qualities and styles.

Originally, German dirndl was only available and worn in a limited range of shades: mostly in blues, greys, whites, and browns.

Styles

Lighter shades such as whites or greys were worn during the summers and darker shades during the winters; While blues were mostly worn during more formal events such as weddings. The summer dresses would have shorter sleeves and used pastel or lighter colors while winters were more suitable for longer and heavier fabrics.

Nowadays, you can find them in a range of colors and styles to suit your preference and they look so fashionable that you do not have to worry about looking odd!

Components of Dirndl

The dress consists of a few pieces: a blouse, skirt, apron, and leather shoes. The blouse can be found in many styles with more classic ones consisting of a high cut which outlines your curves, making you look more daunting, or, a formal cut which was how it was originally worn around the nobility class back in the day. Even if you wear a normal blouse, the bodice ensures your dress stands out in all the right places, making you look gracious but attractive at the same time.

Bundhosen

The leather tracht is the original version that was inspired to become ‘lederhosen’ in the 19th Century. They are basically leather breaches that were invented to meet the growing needs of the industrial revolution and before that, countryside farmers needed attire that could withstand extreme environmental and working conditions.

Difference between the Two Leather Breeches

A longer version of lederhosen, known as bundhosen was worn in more warm or city-side areas. Bundhosen can be worn alone- with a shirt and shoes or also with a jacket which was usually sold along with the leather breeches.

Embroidery on a dirndl or lederhosen would usually describe the tribe or region someone belonged to. So when travelers were traveling around central Europe and came across a man or woman wearing their cultural dress, they would look at the carvings or designs on their outfits to determine which region of Europe they were present in. Moreover, they are most commonly worn at cultural festivals such as Oktoberfest in today’s world.