Ancient Greek clothing is often described as simple, simplistic or even boring. Of course the myth of the clear white clothing has been debunked long ago, together with the white marble buildings and statues, most of which is now proven that they were once vividly coloured and decorated.

 

Still, Greek clothing is dominated by rectangular pieces of cloth that one can only wear in so many ways, and if one should compare them with that of other periods and cultures, before or after the classical Greeks, the comparison would be not so flattering perhaps for our period of interest.

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This misconception derives from a main difference between our sense of fashion and that of the Greeks. Whilst our fashion is defined mainly by the elaborate patterns of clothing, the ancient Greeks were focused towards the quality of the fabrics, the decoration on them, either interwoven, embroidered, sewn painted and other methods, and the way they draped around the body.They played with the length of fabrics, the amount of overfold, the pleating,the belting, the materials and basically they did everything to differentiate themselves, while keeping in line with the fashions of their times. Recent analyses have shown that in their template of fashionable things were the use of different materials on the same garment, like wool and silk and even cotton. They also created delicate texture patterns by inserting thicker yarn in equal intervals, and who knows how many other techniques contributed to make their clothes distinguished, elaborate and beautiful.

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It is quite difficult to find the correct type of fabrics nowadays. Seldom do off the shelf fabrics qualify for how ancient fabrics looked and handled like, let alone the decoration. Skilled weavers are by far the safest way to go, even if the cost is increased.

 

Unfortunately the amount and nature of the surviving clothing from archeological finds is so small that it can only confirm the use of certain tecniques, colours, and materials. For everything else we rely on artistic representations, vases, sculptures mosaics and frescos. The problem with these is that they can hardly define the material represented, and that as artistic style changed, the same things were represented differently. It is escential then that when studying the depictions of pieces of clothing, we also consider the artistic tendences of the period our source is dated to. 

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In rare occasions literary sources provide us with some feedback on the materials or the names of certain unknown garments, or the context in which they were used. We have the names and a context for the "katonake" (κατωνάκη), the "phormos"(φορμός) and the "difthera" (διφθέρα) for instance, even descriptions of them, but because they were used by the lower classes, workmen, farmers and sailors they are not often depicted in artwork, and thus their reconstruction would be very hypothetical. 

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More details about how some of the clothes of ancient Greek women were probably made and worn are given in the respective categories below.