Fashion and the Ren Fair

have you ever been to your local Renaissance Festival?
wow. if you haven't been, i highly recommend it for A. PRIME freak-watching ..um, i mean people watching opportunities and B. for a lesson in how-not-to dress yourself.
let me first preface this by saying that if you're a member of PETA, stop reading now and never go to one of these things because in Medieval times wearing and eating dead things was considered high class.

ok, so all of us adults understand that even the guy who has been living in his parent's basement for 20 years and playing dungeons and dragons needs love too, but these festivals seem to be that set's equivalent to match.com. who knew that you could accesorize your outfit with a sword and a mace? cool...yeah, too bad that guy was wearing a cloak...and tights.

ladies, some of us were not meant to have cleavage and some of us need to learn when to "let it all hang out" and when its best to ... not.
the fest does a good job of illustrating both extremes, and a few others i couldn't possibly have immagined, like that when your clothes are too tight cleavage pops out all over, like in the back, out the side and underneath - ow, that looks painful.

still, this is definitely the place to find certain fashion accessory staples:
like handmade semi-precious stone & beaded jewelry for cheaper than you could make yourself,
custom made (by hand) all leather boots/shoes/sandals,
and even the most adorable hand-knit 100% wool winter hats
(the one i bought was black with varying shades of pink skulls & bones on it.)

beauty may be pain but the ren fair is conclusive proof that reality is stranger than fiction.