Summary. Monastic is a fashion aesthetic organized around the visual grammar of religious communal dress: enveloping silhouettes, muted or undyed palettes, minimal ornament, and a preference for natural, heavy cloth. The historical source is the Western Christian monastic tradition, particularly the Benedictine and Cistercian orders, whose rules prescribed plain garments made from locally produced wool and linen. Chapter 55 of the Rule of Saint Benedict, written around 530 CE, specified that monks should receive a tunic, cowl, scapular, stockings, and shoes, with materials suited to climate rather than vanity. Cistercian monks, founded in 1098 at Citeaux in Burgundy, distinguished themselves from the Benedictines partly through their insistence on undyed wool, earning the name "White Monks." In contemporary fashion, the monastic label describes clothing that borrows this visual logic of coverage, repetition, and restraint without claiming liturgical function. Designers including Rick Owens, Yohji Yamamoto, Ann Demeulemeester, and Haider Ackermann have drawn on robe-like proportions, hooded cowl shapes, and earth-tone palettes in collections that reference monastic dress as a secular position against display. The aesthetic's appeal in fashion lies in what it refuses: color variety, body-conscious cut, decorative embellishment, and seasonal novelty. Garments read as austere rather than minimal, heavy rather than sleek, and deliberately indifferent to trends.

In Material Terms

The material identity of monastic fashion rests on a small number of natural fibers, processed simply and used in weights and weaves that prioritize durability over refinement. The original monastic textile economy was local and self-sufficient. Benedictine and Cistercian monasteries operated their own sheep flocks, flax fields, and weaving workshops from the early medieval period onward, producing cloth within the community rather than purchasing it from outside traders. This self-sufficiency shaped the material character of monastic dress: fabrics were limited to what could be grown, sheared, spun, and woven on or near the monastery grounds.

Wool. Wool was the primary monastic textile in northern and central Europe. Monasteries across England, France, and the Low Countries kept sheep and processed the fleece through washing (to remove lanolin and dirt), carding (to align fibers), spinning (on drop spindles or, after the 13th century, on spinning wheels), and weaving on warp-weighted or horizontal treadle looms. The resulting cloth ranged from coarse rustic broadcloth to moderately refined twill, depending on the breed of sheep, the skill of the spinners, and the finishing process. Cistercian wool was left undyed, producing a natural palette that ranged from off-white through cream to light brown depending on the sheep breed. The Cistercians specifically rejected the black-dyed wool worn by Benedictines, treating the absence of dye as a marker of humility and material honesty. This distinction had economic significance as well: dyeing required expensive imported materials (woad for blue, madder for red, weld for yellow), and avoiding dye reduced both cost and dependence on trade networks.

Medieval monastic wool typically weighed between 300 and 500 grams per square meter, considerably heavier than modern suiting wool (usually 200 to 300 g/m2). This weight gave garments their characteristic drape: heavy enough to fall in vertical folds rather than clinging to the body, stiff enough to hold a cylindrical silhouette when belted at the waist. The plain weave and twill weave structures used in monastic workshops produced fabric with moderate texture and little sheen, in contrast to the satin weaves and fulled finishes available in urban textile markets. Felted wool, produced by agitating woven cloth in hot water to mat the fibers together, was used for outer garments and cowls where wind and rain resistance mattered.

Contemporary designers who reference monastic textiles tend toward similar specifications: medium-to-heavy wool in plain or twill weave, undyed or dyed in muted earth tones, with a matte surface and visible fiber texture. Rick Owens uses boiled wool and felted cashmere in weights that approximate medieval broadcloth. Jan-Jan Van Essche sources undyed Peruvian alpaca and Belgian linen for garments whose surface texture recalls hand-processed monastic cloth.

Linen. Flax was cultivated in monastery gardens across Europe for both linen cloth and linseed oil. Linen processing is labor-intensive: harvested flax stalks must be retted (soaked to rot the outer bark), broken, scutched (beaten to separate fiber from woody core), and hackled (combed to align fibers) before spinning. Monastic communities had the collective labor to sustain this process. The resulting linen was used for undergarments, summer tunics, and altar cloths. Undyed linen ranges from pale straw to grey-beige depending on the retting process and degree of bleaching. Sun-bleaching on grass fields (a process documented in medieval manuscripts) gradually whitened linen over repeated exposures.

Linen's material behavior is relevant to the monastic aesthetic: it wrinkles readily and permanently, softens with repeated washing, and develops a visible patina of use over time. A linen tunic worn daily for months acquires creases and drape patterns specific to the wearer's body, making the garment a physical record of habitual wear. This aging behavior aligns with monastic values of endurance and acceptance of imperfection. In contemporary monastic-influenced fashion, linen is used in similar applications: loose tunics, wide trousers, and layering pieces in natural or muted tones. Toogood uses heavy-weight Irish linen for smock-like garments. Lemaire's linen pieces emphasize the fabric's tendency to soften and collapse rather than hold a pressed shape.

Hemp and other coarse naturals. Hemp cloth appears in medieval monastic inventories, particularly for sacking, work garments, and rope. The fiber is coarser than linen but more durable, and it was cheaper to produce in quantity. Hemp fabric weighs heavier per area than linen of similar thread count and has a rougher hand. Some monastic orders, particularly mendicant friars such as the Franciscans (founded 1209), specifically chose coarse undyed cloth as a marker of voluntary poverty. The Franciscan habit was originally made from whatever rough cloth was available locally, deliberately rejecting the finer wool used by wealthier orders.

In contemporary fashion, hemp is used less frequently than wool or linen but appears in brands aligned with the monastic palette. Elena Dawson has used hemp canvas for jerkin-like outer layers. Ziggy Chen incorporates hemp-linen blends in loose, robe-adjacent silhouettes.

Construction and finishing. Monastic garments were constructed with minimal pattern complexity. The tunic, the foundational garment of the Western monastic habit, is essentially two rectangles of fabric sewn at the shoulders and sides, with a head opening cut or slit at the center top. The scapular is a long rectangular panel worn over the tunic, hanging from the shoulders to approximately knee or ankle length, front and back. The cowl is a hooded overgarment, often with wide sleeves, constructed from a simple T-shape with an attached hood. These pattern shapes require almost no waste fabric and can be cut from straight lengths of cloth without complex tailoring.

This construction logic carries into contemporary monastic fashion. Designers working in this register favor garments built from rectangular and trapezoidal panels rather than curved or darted pattern pieces. Seaming is minimal, closures are simple (ties, wraps, buttons, toggles), and the garment's form comes from the weight and drape of the fabric rather than from tailored structure. The absence of elaborate construction detail is the point: the garment communicates through material and proportion rather than through technical virtuosity.

At Category Level

Monastic fashion occupies a position distinct from both minimalism and historical revival. It is not minimalism, which tends toward clean lines, light fabrics, and contemporary polish. It is not medieval costuming, which attempts period accuracy. The monastic aesthetic borrows a specific vocabulary from religious dress, primarily the proportions (floor-length, wide-sleeved, hooded), the palette (earth tones, undyed neutrals, black), and the material logic (natural fibers, heavy weight, simple construction), and applies them to contemporary garments that are worn as ordinary clothing rather than as ritual dress.

The label "monastic" began appearing in fashion journalism in the 1980s and 1990s to describe the work of Japanese and Belgian designers who were showing austere, draped, dark-palette collections in Paris. Yohji Yamamoto's oversized black garments, Rei Kawakubo's deconstructed volumes, and the Antwerp Six's (including Ann Demeulemeester and Dries Van Noten) stripped-back presentations were described using terms like "monastic," "ascetic," and "clerical." The word served as a shorthand for clothing that appeared to reject fashion-system values (color, decoration, body display, seasonal novelty) while still operating within the fashion system's commercial and critical infrastructure.

The aesthetic has maintained consistent presence in fashion without major trend cycles. It does not boom and recede the way grunge or Y2K fashion does. Instead, it persists as a steady register available to designers and wearers who are drawn to austerity, natural materials, and volume-based silhouettes. This stability reflects the aesthetic's roots: monastic dress itself was designed to resist change, to look the same year after year, and to prioritize function and humility over novelty.

Methodologically

This entry treats monastic as an austerity-driven material logic. The aesthetic is defined by what it subtracts (color, ornament, body-conscious shaping, fashion-calendar responsiveness) rather than by what it adds. Garments are analyzed through their fabric weight, drape behavior, construction simplicity, and palette restraint. The historical monastic wardrobe provides the reference vocabulary, but the entry evaluates contemporary garments on their material and proportional alignment with that vocabulary rather than on their historical fidelity.

Word (Etymology)

"Monastic" derives from the Late Latin monasticus, itself from the Greek monastikos ("solitary, of a monk"), from monazein ("to live alone"), from monos ("alone, single"). The Greek root reflects the original meaning: the monastic life was defined by withdrawal from ordinary social participation. In English, "monastic" has been used since the 15th century to describe things relating to monks, monasteries, or the religious life of seclusion.

In fashion writing, "monastic" entered common use as a descriptive adjective in the 1980s, applied to garments and collections that evoked the visual character of religious habits without literal replication. The term functions as a category label that communicates a specific set of visual signals: coverage, austerity, volume, earth tones, natural fibers. It is used more loosely than "goth" or "punk" because it does not describe a subcultural community with its own codes of authentication.

Subculture

Monastic is a descriptive aesthetic rather than a subculture. There is no monastic fashion community with shared gathering spaces, social rituals, or authentication hierarchies comparable to those found in goth, grunge, or Harajuku. The aesthetic is adopted by individuals drawn to austerity and simplicity, but these individuals do not typically identify as members of a collective or organize around the label.

The closest analogue to a community is the overlap between monastic fashion and broader slow-fashion, natural-fiber, and craft-oriented networks. Wearers of Jan-Jan Van Essche, Toogood, and Cosmic Wonder tend to share interests in artisan production, natural dyes, and textile heritage, and these interests produce loose affinity networks on social media. However, these networks are organized around craft values rather than around monastic identity specifically.

Within actual religious communities, the habit continues to function as a lived garment rather than a fashion reference. Benedictine, Cistercian, Trappist, and Carthusian monks and nuns still wear habits cut to patterns that have changed only incrementally since the medieval period. The continued production of monastic garments by communities such as the Trappists at Gethsemani Abbey in Kentucky or the Benedictines at Solesmes in France represents an unbroken tradition of the material practices that the fashion aesthetic draws from.

History

• 6th century - Benedict of Nursia wrote the Rule of Saint Benedict around 530 CE at Monte Cassino in southern Italy. Chapter 55, "On the Clothing and Footwear of the Brothers," specified that monks should receive garments suited to local climate and conditions: a tunic, a cowl (cuculla), a scapular for work, stockings, and shoes. Benedict emphasized that clothing should be adequate and humble, not a source of complaint or vanity. The chapter instructed the abbot to supply garments from whatever was locally available, a principle that tied monastic dress to regional textile production.
• 1098 - Robert of Molesme founded the Cistercian order at Citeaux, Burgundy. The Cistercians reformed Benedictine practice, returning to strict observance of the Rule. Their dress reflected this austerity: undyed natural wool replaced the black-dyed habits of the established Benedictines. The Cistercians became known as "White Monks" for the pale color of their unprocessed wool garments. Cistercian monasteries also became major wool producers, particularly in England, where houses such as Fountains Abbey and Rievaulx Abbey ran extensive sheep operations that supplied both domestic use and the export wool trade.
• 1209 - Francis of Assisi founded the Franciscan order with an emphasis on absolute poverty. Franciscan habits were made from the cheapest available cloth, typically rough undyed wool or hemp. The deliberate coarseness of the garment was central to the order's identity: wearing poor cloth was a daily enactment of the vow of poverty.
• 1981 - Yohji Yamamoto and Rei Kawakubo (Comme des Garcons) showed their first Paris collections. The oversized, dark, draped silhouettes provoked comparisons to religious dress in the French fashion press. While neither designer explicitly referenced monasticism, the visual vocabulary (black, voluminous, unadorned, body-obscuring) established the design language that would later be described as monastic in fashion writing.
• 1985-1990s - Ann Demeulemeester, one of the Antwerp Six, developed a signature style of layered, flowing, predominantly black garments that drew frequent monastic and ascetic comparisons. Haider Ackermann's early work explored similarly austere layering with longer hemlines and wrapped closures.
• 1988 - Martin Margiela showed his first collection in Paris, exposing linings, seam allowances, and construction details as design elements. Margiela's work shared monastic fashion's interest in garment structure as visible content, and his palette of white, ecru, and undyed materials overlapped with the Cistercian-derived neutral register.
• 2002 onward - Rick Owens established a design practice that consistently references monastic proportions: floor-length robes, hooded garments, draped tunics, and heavy natural-fiber fabrics in a palette dominated by black, grey, dust, and pearl. Owens has cited the visual weight and gravity of religious dress as an influence. His label, based in Paris, showed collections with names such as "Sphinx," "Vicious," and "Babel" that used ancient and religious vocabulary alongside the monastic silhouette.
• 2010s-present - The monastic label stabilized in fashion writing as a recognized aesthetic descriptor. Brands including The Row, Lemaire, Jan-Jan Van Essche, and Toogood are regularly described using monastic references. The aesthetic's emphasis on natural materials and deliberate simplicity has aligned it with broader slow-fashion and anti-consumption movements. Jan-Jan Van Essche, working from Antwerp, began sourcing undyed alpaca and handwoven textiles from artisan cooperatives in Peru and India, connecting the contemporary monastic wardrobe to global craft production networks.

Silhouette

The monastic silhouette is vertical and enveloping. The body is wrapped in fabric that falls from the shoulders to the floor or below the knee, producing a columnar outline that moves as a single mass rather than articulating the limbs individually.

• floor-length robes and long tunics reaching below the knee or to the ankle
• hooded cowls and deep draped hoods
• voluminous, enveloping shapes that obscure the body's outline
• dropped shoulders with wide, sometimes batwing sleeves
• cape-like overlays and poncho-form outer layers
• high or gathered necklines, often wrapped or stand-collar
• layered compositions where inner and outer garments are visible simultaneously
• wide-leg trousers in heavy fabric, often with drawstring or tie waists

The layering system follows the logic of the historical monastic habit: an inner tunic provides the base layer, a scapular or vest adds a second plane of fabric over the torso, and a cowl or cloak completes the outer layer. Contemporary monastic fashion replicates this three-layer system with long-sleeved base shirts, mid-layer tunics or vests, and outer robes or overcoats. The result is a silhouette that gains visual depth from the interplay of multiple fabric layers rather than from a single garment's cut.

Materials

The material list is short and deliberately limited. Every fabric listed below shares two properties: it is a natural fiber, and its surface texture is visible rather than polished smooth.

• wool in medium to heavy weights (300-500 g/m2), plain or twill weave, often undyed or earth-toned
• linen in natural, unbleached, or low-dye finishes
• hemp and hemp-linen blends for coarser outer garments
• felted or boiled wool for outerwear and cowls
• heavy cotton canvas and cotton twill in raw or garment-washed finishes
• cashmere and alpaca in undyed or muted tones for luxury applications
• rough-woven or hand-loomed textiles with visible fiber texture

Synthetic fabrics, high-sheen finishes, and performance membranes are absent. The aesthetic depends on fiber behavior that only natural textiles provide: wool's capacity to felt and insulate when damp, linen's progressive softening through use, hemp's rough durability.

Color Palette

The palette is derived directly from the colors of undyed and minimally dyed natural fibers, and from the habits of historical monastic orders. Different orders wore different colors, but all avoided bright or complex dyes.

• oatmeal, ecru, and undyed cream (referencing Cistercian undyed wool)
• deep brown, umber, chestnut, and walnut (referencing Franciscan and Carmelite habits)
• charcoal, slate grey, and ash
• black (referencing Benedictine and Augustinian habits)
• off-white and bone
• muted olive and moss (secondary, used sparingly)
• occasional deep burgundy or wine

The palette excludes saturated primary colors, neon, and pattern. The logic is additive absence: each color that does not appear reinforces the austerity of the palette that does.

Details

• minimal seaming and simple pattern geometry (rectangular and trapezoidal panels)
• wrap closures, tie belts, and rope or cord cinctures
• toggle and loop closures, wooden or horn buttons
• raw or hand-finished edges where fabric weight permits
• visible hand-stitching or simple topstitching
• patch pockets set flat against the body
• absence of decorative hardware, logos, or print

Accessories

Accessories in the monastic register are few, functional, and made from natural materials. The logic mirrors the garments: nothing decorative, nothing that draws attention to itself as an object of display.

• leather sandals (referencing traditional monastic footwear, often with a single strap or thong construction)
• simple flat ankle boots in unpolished, vegetable-tanned leather
• plain slip-on shoes with minimal sole profile
• woven or leather belts, often used as waist cinches over tunics (the historical cincture, a rope or cord belt, is the most direct monastic reference)
• simple leather bags or satchels in natural finishes
• scarves and wraps in matching natural-fiber cloth, used as head coverings or shoulder layers
• no jewelry, or only simple bands and pendants in matte metal, wood, or unpolished stone

Body Logic

Monastic styling treats the body as a secondary element beneath the garment. Volume and coverage redirect attention from the wearer's figure to the drape and fall of fabric. The silhouette is cylindrical or conical rather than fitted, wrapping the body in a column of cloth that moves as a unit rather than articulating individual body parts. This approach parallels the original function of monastic dress: the habit was designed to efface individuality and bodily display in favor of communal uniformity.

Gender distinctions are minimal. The aesthetic's proportions, which rely on volume, length, and drape rather than on waist suppression or shoulder emphasis, produce garments that read as functionally unisex. Many monastic-referenced brands (Jan-Jan Van Essche, Toogood, Cosmic Wonder) design without gender categories. The body underneath is suggested by the way fabric moves during walking and sitting, but it is never outlined or displayed.

Comfort and repeatability are built into the logic. Garments are loose enough to permit a full range of movement without restriction, and their simple forms are designed to be worn daily without variation. The monastic wardrobe was, historically, a uniform: each monk received the same garments, wore them until they were worn out, and replaced them with identical items. Contemporary monastic fashion echoes this pattern through wardrobes built on a small number of interchangeable, tonally consistent pieces that can be worn in rotation without generating the impression of repetition as failure.

Garment Logic

Monastic garments are evaluated through three criteria: weight, drape, and simplicity of construction.

Weight. The aesthetic requires fabrics heavy enough to fall vertically and hold their silhouette without internal structure. Lightweight fabrics that flutter or cling undermine the monastic read. A floor-length tunic in 150 g/m2 cotton reads as nightwear; the same garment in 400 g/m2 linen or wool reads as deliberate, grounded, and architecturally present. Weight is the mechanism that separates monastic clothing from bohemian or ethereal aesthetics that also use loose, long silhouettes.

Drape. The garment's behavior on the body matters more than its cut. Monastic garments generate visual interest through the way fabric folds, pools, and cascades rather than through pattern complexity or decorative detail. The cowl creates a deep fold at the neckline. The tunic pools at the belt. The robe sweeps across the floor. These drape behaviors are the garment's primary visual content, and they depend on the relationship between fabric weight, fiber content, and garment dimensions. Stiffer fabrics (heavy linen, canvas) produce angular, architectural folds. Softer fabrics (boiled wool, heavy jersey) produce rounder, more gravitational drape.

Simplicity of construction. The fewer seams, darts, and closures a garment uses, the closer it sits to the monastic register. The ideal monastic garment can be understood from the outside: the viewer can see how the fabric is arranged, where the seams fall, how the closure works. There is no hidden engineering, no concealed boning, no complex internal structure. The garment is legible as a piece of cloth shaped around a body through the simplest available means.

Motifs and Themes

The central theme is voluntary austerity: the deliberate choice of less when more is available. In medieval monasticism, this was a religious discipline. In contemporary fashion, it functions as a rejection of the fashion system's emphasis on novelty, variety, and visual competition. Wearing monastic-influenced clothing communicates restraint as a value rather than as a limitation.

Repetition and uniformity operate as secondary themes. The monastic wardrobe was historically identical from monk to monk and day to day. Contemporary monastic fashion echoes this through capsule-wardrobe approaches where a small number of pieces in consistent tones and proportions are worn interchangeably. The absence of variety is intentional rather than accidental.

Material honesty is a third theme. The aesthetic values fabrics that present their fiber content without disguise: wool that looks and feels like wool, linen that wrinkles like linen, hemp that shows its coarse texture. Synthetic blends, high-sheen finishes, and performance treatments that alter a fabric's natural behavior are inconsistent with the monastic register.

Withdrawal from display runs through all three themes. The aesthetic positions the wearer as someone who has opted out of fashion's attention economy, choosing garments that attract notice through their quietness rather than through spectacle.

Cultural Touchstones

• Rule of Saint Benedict, Chapter 55 (c. 530 CE): The foundational text governing Western monastic dress. Benedict specified the tunic, cowl, scapular, stockings, and shoes, and instructed that garments should suit the local climate and be free of vanity. The chapter established the principle that clothing should serve the body's needs without exceeding them.
• Cistercian undyed wool (1098 onward): The Cistercian rejection of dyed fabric in favor of natural wool created the visual signature that most directly informs the monastic fashion palette. The "White Monks" designation persists in art history and costume reference.
• Umberto Eco, The Name of the Rose (1980, novel; 1986, film): The novel and its film adaptation (starring Sean Connery) brought detailed images of medieval Benedictine monastic life, including the visual austerity of monastic dress, to a wide audience.
• Rick Owens runway presentations (2002 onward): Owens's consistent use of floor-length garments, hooded silhouettes, draped constructions, and muted palettes has made his label the most visible contemporary reference point for monastic fashion.
• Yohji Yamamoto's Paris debut (1981): Yamamoto's oversized, dark, draped garments introduced the Japanese avant-garde approach that would become one of the two main design lineages (alongside the Belgian deconstructionists) feeding monastic fashion.
• Ann Demeulemeester's layered black collections (1985-2013): Demeulemeester's flowing, predominantly black garments in natural fabrics established the Belgian contribution to monastic-adjacent fashion, emphasizing movement and drape over structure.
• Fountains Abbey, Yorkshire (founded 1132): One of the largest Cistercian monasteries in England, now a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The abbey's ruins and its documented history as a major wool-producing estate provide a physical reference point for the scale of medieval monastic textile production.
• Philip Groning, Into Great Silence (2005): The documentary film spent six months inside the Grande Chartreuse, a Carthusian monastery in the French Alps, showing monks in their white wool habits going about daily life. The film brought the visual reality of contemporary monastic dress to art-house audiences.

Brands and Designers

• Rick Owens (2002, Paris): floor-length robes, hooded garments, draped tunics in heavy natural fabrics; the most consistent contemporary monastic design reference
• Yohji Yamamoto (1972, Tokyo): oversized, draped, predominantly black garments with monastic volume and body-obscuring proportions
• Ann Demeulemeester (1985, Antwerp): layered black garments in natural fibers, flowing silhouettes referencing ascetic dress
• The Row (2006, New York): austere luxury in natural fabrics, minimal construction, earth-tone and neutral palettes
• Lemaire (2010 relaunch, Paris): quiet, draped garments in linen, wool, and cotton with monastic proportions and restrained palettes
• Jan-Jan Van Essche (2010, Antwerp): undyed alpaca, handwoven linen, and naturally processed textiles in robe-like silhouettes; explicitly references artisanal and monastic textile traditions
• Toogood (2013, London): smock-based garments in heavy linen, canvas, and wool; designed without gender categories
• Jil Sander (1968, Hamburg): austere minimalism in natural fabrics that overlaps with the monastic palette and proportional logic
• Uma Wang (2005, Shanghai/Milan): layered, draped garments in heavy knits and natural fabrics with monastic length and volume
• Cosmic Wonder (1997, Tokyo): handwoven, naturally dyed textiles in simple garment forms; the label's craft orientation aligns it with monastic material values
• Haider Ackermann (2001, Paris): layered, austere garments with long hemlines, wrapped closures, and earth-tone palettes
• Elena Dawson (2004, Berlin): hand-finished garments in hemp, linen, and coarse wool referencing medieval and monastic construction
• Craig Green (2012, London): panel-based geometric garments that share monastic fashion's emphasis on simple construction and body-obscuring volume
• Ziggy Chen (2012, Shanghai): oversized, layered garments in dark and earth-tone natural fabrics with visible handwork and asymmetric drape

References

[1] Benedict of Nursia. The Rule of Saint Benedict. Chapter 55: "On the Clothing and Footwear of the Brothers." c. 530 CE. Available at https://ccel.org/ccel/benedict/rule2/rule55.html [2] Order of Saint Benedict. "The Monastic Habit." https://osb.org/how-we-live/the-monastic-habit/ [3] Eco, Umberto. The Name of the Rose. Harcourt, 1983 (English translation). [4] Burns, E. Jane. Sea of Silk: A Textile Geography of Women's Work in Medieval French Literature. University of Pennsylvania Press, 2009. [5] Crowfoot, Elisabeth, Frances Pritchard, and Kay Staniland. Textiles and Clothing, c. 1150 - c. 1450. Medieval Finds from Excavations in London, vol. 4. Museum of London, 1992. [6] Lawrence, C.H. Medieval Monasticism: Forms of Religious Life in Western Europe in the Middle Ages. 4th ed., Routledge, 2015. [7] Bolton, Andrew. Rei Kawakubo/Comme des Garcons: Art of the In-Between. Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2017.