Dear Reader,
The weather dictates the outfit and the most actual and loved items of today are the clothes that include the hood. Nowadays, one of the core and integral part of our basic wardrobe is the hoody, which is way more preferred than the hat! Weather conditions protection, decorations and just an element of the image for certain groups of teenagers – those and other functions make this element beloved detail of their daily look. It lies beautifully on the shoulders, and dressed on the head creates a feeling of security and comfort. Therefore, it is so common in sportswear, the motto of which is: “… convenience and practicality …”.
Moreover, we are so used to wearing relaxed, but the convenient and fashionable cloth that we disregard the origin of many things that seem to be always with us. So let’s figure out when did the hood come to our life? The hood is a piece of material, a folding headdress that is sewn on or fastened to the collar of the clothes. The etymology of the word is associated with the French word “cappuchon” and the Latin caputium translated as the monk hat.
The history of its occurrence goes back into the centuries, has the religious nature and is difficult to establish. The historians take the reference point from ancient Rome and Byzantium times. At that time the noble Romans preferred to leave the proudly raised head uncovered. So the “cuculus” was used only when it was necessary to protect them from scorching rays of sun, rain or wind. Therefore, the ancient hood was the clothing of the common people. However, the practicality of the “cucula” has earned an immense popularity among monasticism (it has become part of the monastic attire) and medieval warriors – the chain mail hood with a crown was an integral part of the battle suit until the appearance of metal armor.
One of the brightest historical episodes associated with the use of the hood as an element of clothing monk. For the church, the hood is a symbol of detachment from the world, spirit, though. The hood had a brown color, a sharp end. Thanks to the pointed hood, one of the monks’ directions were called the Order of the Little Capuchin Brothers, founded in 1527 in Italy.
Contrary, in the Middle Ages, there was a ban on wearing a hat. Hebrews, lepers, sex workers were forbidden to wear it. Only representatives of the clergy and the ruling dynasty possessed the right to wear an expensively decorated cap sewed from expensive silk and decorated with embroidery. Representatives of these classes wore such hats at important occasions and services in the church. The color and regularity were important: the larger the size and lighter the color, the higher the wealth and rank of the host.
For some time hood was also used as an element of mourning clothes till the time it became regulated. People simply chose clothes of darker colors, without decorations. The hood was not worn on the head but simply wrapped around the neck. In Western Europe, wearing hood was the expression of grief. In this case, there were no class restrictions on the wearing of the hood.
At the beginning of our century, Rocky Balboa made his triumphant ascent into the minds of all admirers of American cinema. Work hero, a street thug and a true athlete. His selfless workouts betrayed the Italian district in which he was born. Jogging among the predawn landscapes, he defended himself from the winter cold with warm sweatpants, a warmed cap, and a worn gray hoodie covered with a sweatshirt. Rocky came from nowhere and by perpetuating himself, he perpetuated hoodie.
Subsequently, American football players and athletes began to wear sweatshirts during and after training. What inspired fashion for wearing coarse male sweatshirts among female cheerleaders. And so the hoodies began to enter the daily wardrobe. In the late seventies, on the streets of New York, a strong subculture began to develop, hip-hop, spawned local heroes like Rocky. Hood and pockets, more defense, space for self-isolation. The size of the sweatshirt has increased. And the stars Hip-Hop gave their sweatshirts status.
The hood of the sweatshirt can also work as a cobra hood – to remove it means to prepare for an attack. But even more important is its function to create anonymity shroud. It helped at least for two types of people acting in the urban spawning grounds of hip-hop: the authors of graffiti and the so-called ‘children of the collar’, or robbers, the most positive of them in the ancient times was “Robin Hood”.
By the late 1990s, the growing popularity of hip-hop clothes inspired brands such as Tommy Hilfiger and Ralph Lauren, and even high-fashion designers like Gucci and Versace, to create their own unique sweatshirts. The latest innovation is a sweatshirt for nursing mothers, with two valves for feeding.
A sweatshirt – as a challenge, insolence and aggression at the beginning, borders on warmth, care and comfort today, as if, recalling Rocky’s cold jogs, during which his beloved, gray, warmed him was warm.
In the modern worldhood is ubiquitous. It has a unique feature to give a sense of security from the outside world, adverse weather conditions. The symbol of freedom, simplicity, comfort, and security today has become a core of the basic wardrobe and sports cloth. I absolutely love its warmth comfort and connection to the inner world that it gives once you cover the head!
XoXoLenLenStyle
Thanks for reading me
