Tudor Dinner

A Feast With Henry VIII at The Wadsworth Atheneum

Pahl and Danielle in front of The Picture Gallery of Carinal Silvio Valenti Gonzaga, 1749 by Giovanni Paolo Panini

Our last event in May 2025 was the Tudor Dinner at the Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art in Hartford, CT. This was a special event that the museum created in honor of receiving Hans Holbein's 1540 portrait of Henry the VIII on loan from the Palazzo Barberini in Rome. The description of the event was "to experience a Tudor-style banquet and meet Henry the VIII!  The castle comes to life through music, culinary delights, and speciality drinks. Period costumes are encouraged."

The event cost $75 per person (or $65 if you were a Hartford resident or museum member), and it was worth every penny. We were seated in the main gallery right next to famous paintings, like the one that Pahl and I are standing in front of. I had never been so close to the art! Across the room from us, a lute player performed while we ate. A large banquet table was laid out with turkey legs, bone-in hams, stewed beef with mushrooms, bread, fruit, roasted vegetables and fruit pies. We could go back for as many servings as we liked. 

To start the feast, Henry the VIII arrived in the flesh along with some of his wives and local dignitaries of the age dressed in period costume. These folks were not just mere actors, but actual museum scholars presenting lectures at various art works in the museum during the feast. 

Pahl ready to bite into the turkey leg

My plate with elderflower adult beverage. I liked the gold tableware but if we were being real Tudor era we should have been eating with our hands and knives only.

​The Tudor period occurred between 1485-1603 and included the Elizabethian era during the reign of Elizabeth I (1558-1603). The Tudor period is characterized by the rule of the Tudor family following Henry Tudor's victory over Richard III in the Battle of Bosworth. This era marked the conclusion of the Wars of the Roses (a series of civil conflicts between the Lancaster and York houses). The period began with King Henry VII and continued through his son King Henry VIII and his grandchildren Edward VI, Mary I and Elizabeth I. The Tudor Period remains significant for its profound influence on English history, culture, governance, as well as reflecting the complexities of monarchy, religion, and societal change during that time. 

Fashion was actually extremely important during the Tudor period, because rich people used their clothing as a sign of how wealthy they were. Their clothes were made from fine wool, linen, and silk and often decorated with gold thread and jewels. Men wore white silk shirts with frills at the neck and cuffs and loose fitting trousers. Women wore corsets under bodices to make their waists look small and padded underskirts to give more structure to the floor-length gowns they wore over them. There were even special rules called Sumptuary Laws to dictate what the different social classes could and could not wear. Only members of the royal family could wear purple silk, only those above the title of Viscount or Baron could wear cloth of gold or silver, and only those who earned over 100 pounds a year could wear satin, damask, silk, or taffeta. 

Based on the Sumptuary Laws of the Tudor era, Pahl and I are posing as a wealthy couple where he has a title above that of Viscount. 

Pahl posing in front of the painting of Daedalus attaching wings to Icarus

Pahl's outfit consists of a blouse (not sure what color to be honest) under a dark brown gambeson that has additional metal details sewn into the sleeves. Over that he is wearing a red and gold embroidered long waist coat with a damask pattern. This is perfectly layered over a pair of dark red loose fitting trousers. Other accessories that repeat the red trousers include a soft red hat that is a little bigger than a modern beret but fits like one (they called them bonnets back then) with embroidered designs at the base of the cap as well as white and brown feathers coming off one side, and a paisley cravat at the neck. Also at the neck is a ruff, worn backwards so that the tie is facing forward. He is also wearing an elaborate green silk sash over all of these elements which appears to have a three-dimensional cross and other embroidered symbols as well as metallic fringe at the bottom. He completes the functional parts of the look with leather riding boots and a black leather waist belt with pouches. 

Danielle next to the same painting as Pahl above

I am wearing a long floor length dress that also has a damask pattern in dark green, brown, and gold. The dress has long sleeves that wrap around my arms so that only my hands are visible. Around my neck is also a ruff, the same one in fact as Pahl's, but I am wearing it with the tie in the back and lower along my neckline. On my head I am wearing an elaborate crown complete with beige felted elements, off-white roses and metal chains with pearls hanging off them. An off white veil with gold stars covers the back of my neck and wraps around to the front as well a little. The look is complete with white short heels with gold stamping on them.

I cheated a little bit as I was entirely reliant on the corset lacing at the front of the dress to achieve the waist cinching look and I am not wearing a padded underskirt to give the bottom of the dress more shape. I did this mainly because true corsets and padded skirts are highly uncomfortable elements while driving a vehicle, and I didn't have any time to even attempt to put them on in the parking garage or restroom once I got there. 

Striking a pose like Henry VIII

We only caught a tiny bit of the lecture about this painting because I am a painfully slow eater.  But what we did learn was that the outfit that Henry the VIII was wearing in this portrait was physically very heavy. All of the layers and jewels would weigh quite a bit, and he must have had to pose for the portrait for awhile while wearing it. Talk about heavy metal!

I hope that I am good Earl in your kingdom Sire.

The museum staff was pretty jazzed about our costume efforts. I think not only do both our outfits work well on their own, but together it is a wonderful complementary contrast of green and red with similar elements of brown and gold. If there was a prize for best costume, we would have won it. But the best prize is knowing we were the best! I hope the museum continues to come up with fun events like this one!