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What to Wear Yes, you can wear period attire! Men and women at the turn of the century trained in their corsets, waistcoats, top hats, and all the typical attire of the era. Starting around 1900, instructors discouraged women from wearing corsets during exercise. While we would not recommend training in delicate, irreplaceable clothing like your great-grandmother's wedding dress, durable nineteenth-century clothing or reproductions are perfectly appropriate, including corsets, bustles, long skirts, and other characteristic Victorian or Edwardian attire. The material presented is chosen to reflect the fact that Victorian ladies would be restricted with corsetry. If you are frequently accustomed to wearing corsetry, then you may not find it too restrictive, but only you can say. If you choose to train in a corset, we'd suggest you be prepared to remove it if it proves too constricting. The training facility is air-conditioned, but July in New York City can be hot and humid. You may be more comfortable in uncorseted or masculine Victorian exercise attire such as bloomers, knee breeches, a cotton chemise, striped undershirt, and so forth. Nineteenth-century women fenced in high-heeled lace-up boots, but they wore soft flat shoes for other types of physical training. We recommend flats rather than heels, considering that the seminar is four hours in duration. If you do not want to spoil your Victorian appearance with sneakers, Chinese cotton Mary Janes or kung-fu slippers are an alternative. What to Bring Bartitsu incorporates self-defense with a walking stick, parasol, or umbrella, so we recommend you bring one to the seminar. We do not recommend training with fragile antique parasols that are irreplaceable. A contemporary parasol, such as those made of Batenburg lace, would be more suitable. Any sort of walking stick will suffice. If you do not have a walking stick or parasol, a stick umbrella will be perfectly fine. The latter can be purchased from inexpensive luggage and gift shops. The instructor may have a limited number of walking sticks to loan to students if you do not have your own. If you will be joining us at The Way Station for the Saturday evening social, you may wish to bring a change of clothing or a few accessories to spruce up your training attire for the evening event. The training facility has a changing area for your covenience. Click for examples of women's Victorian and Edwardian exericise attire   Click for examples of men's Victorian and Edwardian exericise attire