Estonian Folk Costumes on Stamps

Eesti Post (Estonian Post) is issuing two new stamps featuring Estonian folk costumes.

The set was designed by Mari Kaarma. In addition to the stamps, FDC and two Maxicards will also be made available.

Clothes of more or less the same type as elsewhere in North Estonia were worn in Harju County, although wide differences can be found particularly in the colours and decorations of women's dress.

A girl and a woman from the first half or the middle of the 19th century have been reproduced on the first stamp. The girl's headgear is a so-called eared wreath and a wide red band decorates her green-striped skirt. The girl's sleeve embroidery is rather simple, but the sleeves of the married woman who sports an embroidered apron are decorated with lavish wide embroidery. She wears a pot hat lined with silk. Gradually spreading, such hats crowded out the earlier traditional women's headgear.

The Rapla woman on the other stamp also wears a hat. The so-called eye brooch with red stones was a popular festive decoration. The Rapla woman wears white embroidered sleeves, a skirt with horizontal stripes of a more modern type and a purchased apron with large flowers embroidered on it. The man with the bagpipe wears a grey jacket and light pants with blue stripes. The traditional and quite widespread man's suit in North Estonia was navy blue.