Murandian "New Spring" Fashion

Author: Dar'Jen Ab Owain
Published: August 8 2021 - Tar Valon Times Blog Link

This post contains spoilers for New Spring.

Within New Spring are descriptions of the fashions of various nations. While some are only mentioned in general, others are explored in greater detail. We are given several examples of Murandian fashion.

Fashion for men of Murandy is limited. Bright colors and curled mustaches appear to be common. Murandian dandies are described as “brightly coated” and having “curled mustaches” (p. 63).

Women’s fashion of Murandy is described a bit better. When examining the women who gathered with their infants to have their names taken down, most “wore plain, thick woolens, but half a dozen or so were in silks or at least ornately embroidered dresses of fine cut that indicated wealth or nobility or both” (p. 73).

Most dresses appeared to have high necks. Wealthy women, such as Lady Meri do Ahlan a’Conlin, utilized silk and embroidered fabrics. Her “high-necked green riding dress” was of silk, if not the best, and her “fur-lined blue cloak” was “embroidered in red and gold. And she wore a jeweled ring on every finger” (p. 75). Though certainly not poor, Haesel Palan, a rug merchant, wore “fine brown woolens” (p. 258).

Elaida do Avriny a’Roihan, was a Red Aes Sedai from Murandy. Her clothes exemplified the high-neck and use of embroidery. “Her brocaded dress was not a muted red or a faint red, but a bright hue, as though she were screaming her Ajah to the world. Her cloak, lined in black fur, was exactly the same shade” (p. 84). She later appeared in a “high-necked dress even redder that that she had worn the day before…Her red-fringed shawl was richly embroidered with flowered vines” (p. 104).

Murandian men’s fashion was focused on brightly colored coats and curled mustaches. The fashion for women of Murandy had high-necked dresses and often incorporated embroidery.