For those who are disgusted with the vestments in their Roman parishes, there's hope:

http://www.wattsandco.com/

My parish has some high mass sets made by Watts and they are magnificent. My advice: save, fund-raise, and donate!

John K.

Hey house are actually pretty nice!

I usually poke fun at my RC friends about their Priest Vestments, but these are good.

oops double post

Sub-Deacon Borislav--

They are more than nice--having seen them and touched them. It's unfortunate that they have to be made in England and are purchased and used mainly by Anglicans.

Hmm, you should also try www.luzarvestments.co.uk [luzarvestments.co.uk] and www.susanmaria.com [susanmaria.com]

They're superb!

There's a third site that's absolutely KILLER but I can't remember it for the life of me. It's meant only for clergy, but it's awesome.

Alexis

Oh, I do like this Gothic chasuble featuring Our Lady of Perpetual Help:

[Linked Image]

Since this is the name of my home parish, I was thinking about someday getting this set for our priest...but it's awfully expensive.

Alexis

I would not advise anyone to save, purchase, and donate the good vestments without a reliable insurance that the good vestments will then be worn!

Warning to prospective donors: check with the Priest FIRST. If you donate something strongly against his preferences, the likelihood that it will fade away to nothing before he wears it increases drastically. I can tell you that if someone gave me a Phelonion with an icon on the back of it, and a lace nightgown instead of a sticharion, it would be a long, cold winter before I would thus appear in private, let alone in public.

Fr. Serge

By the Lace nightgown are you talking about a Podriznik?

[Linked Image]

A Phelonion with an icon?

[Linked Image]


[Linked Image]


Hey looks good to me!

Father, be sure to send me all the Phelonion's with Icons and Podriznik's that you receive as gifts. I may need them in the future!

Great Vestments

http://www.nikitatailor.net/customdeaconv.htm

An embroidered Cross is not an icon, nor is a properly made podriznik fashioned of lace. If anyone is silly enough to give me a lace alb you are perfectly welcome to it (provided you pay the shipping costs). But I hope you won't wear it. If you are already wearing lace underwear, please don't tell us; we don't want to know!

Fr. Serge

HEY!

Whats wrong with lace underwear?

J/K



On a more serious note I was referring to the pholonions with the Icon of the Lord and the Icon of the Trinity I posted above.

Now why would you go around wearing icons on your back?

Fr. Serge

Why not?

Dear Alexis:

Glory to Jesus Christ!

That vestment is beautiful! I have a great love for the Holy Virgin under the title of the Virgin of Perpetual Help. I am sure that any priest that loves Our Lady would be delighted to have such a beautiful vestment, but there are some priests who are not devoted to Our Lady and Our Lady really is the Queen of the Clergy. Unfortunately, some people do not stop to think about that. I would like to personally thank you for posting that beatiful vestment.

Do take care and may the Lord and Our Lady keep you well!

God Bless,

John Doucette

John,

Thank you! I too have a special affinity for the Theotokos under the patronage of Our Lady of Perpetual Help, mostly because, as I said earlier, it's the name of my home parish and the parish-church that brought me to Catholicism.

Fr. Serge,

Bless!

To be honest, I was thinking of getting something like this for Father regardless of whether he would choose it for himself or not. I guess I assumed that if a parishioner went to so much trouble and money to purchase such a wondrous chasuble reflecting our very parish, he'd feel guilty as sin if he chose never to wear it.

Anyway, no disrespect meant to parish priests, but I view vestments given as gifts as not just the personal property of the priest; they are for the entire parish community to enjoy and to rightly reflect our worship of God in beauty and truth.

What's NOT to like about that chasuble? Father wears pretty nice vestments as it is, but sometimes four or five inches too short - alb and all. And he's orthodox, too. I don't see why he'd have a problem with it.

GOSH, what is the name of that other website that's absolutely fantastic?!

Alexis

Oh, and I don't see what's wrong with wearing pictorial representations of icons on the back, as seen in the Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox vestments above. It's not
ACTUALLY an icon, so it's not like we have to worry about venerating that image sewn into the vestment.

Alexis

Fr. Serge--

Bless!

I was not advocating a willy-nilly purchase of such high quality and expensive vestments. Obviously there are priests that would balk at the idea of wearing the products of Watts and Co.

Honestly as well, if they were commissioned and purchased by parishioners for the parish the current priest could wear or not wear them at his leisure, understanding that they belong to the parish and not to him. (The same goes for vessels or other liturgical items belonging to the parish.) Eventually, there would come along a priest who would wear them, recognizing their quality.

I was simply trying to show that there are real alternatives to some of the disposable, cookie cutter vestments produced in the USA and Europe and simply FAWNED over by some clerics.

BTW, I would agree with your assessment of lace albs and cottas. Lace belongs on ladies dresses, handkerchiefs and doilies, not on liturgical vesture.

Lace is not girly. Disparaging lace because it seems girly seems about as odd to me as saying priests dress like women because they wear cassocks.

Wearing BRAS is girly; wearing lace? Give me a break! Who gets to decide that what priests have been wearing for a few hundred years is girly?

In case you haven't noticed, I much prefer lace. But if albs and the like absolutely MUST be plain (and I don't see any reasons why they must), at least have them be apparelled, for Heaven's sake.

Alexis

John K:

What happens if the priest puts the gift in a closet, years pass, and the next assigned priest cannot find it?

Something like that happened in my parish some years ago. The pastor asked for donations for buyng a set of each liturgical color for each of the priests of the parish--twelve sets in all. The next pastor didn't like them and by the time the next pastor after him was assigned they'd all disappeared. Sent off to the missions or simply disposed of at some point.

And if you don't think this happens, I was given a carload of vestments once that were being disposed of. I simply went to a small Anglican parish near home and asked the Anglican priest if he'd like any of it. You'd have thought I was Santa Claus and it was Christmas!

I think I'd take Father Serge's advice. One man's beautiful vestment is something another might cringe at. Some of the vestments that were made and used forty years ago are things that most clergy wouldn't even consider wearing today. One thing that comes to mine is that some of the things posted are made of rather heavy material that makes the wearing of them more than uncomfortable for the priest. Buying a set of vestments for a priest is a bit like buying neckwear for Dad on Father's Day: best to have some idea of his taste.

BOB

Dear John,

You and I seem to be in basic agreement here. I join you in deploring cheap vestments, unless one is in a situation of such poverty that one has no choice. Way back when I was a deacon I took a course from Father Boniface Luykx of holy memory and one of his first comments was that the vestments one often finds in America are much too cheap.

There are places where one can obtain good vestments, and they don't have to cost the US Mint. Tip: one can often save money by the simple expedient of buying the materials from a wholesaler (La Lam� in New York is excellent) and then commissioning someone who knows how to do it to sew the vestments to order). Good vestments can be obtined from Moscow and from Athens - but one should expect to pay for them.

To add to the complications, Byzantine vestments should always be tailored to fit the cleric who will wear them. But few priests can afford to maintain a complete wardrobe of high-quality vestments.

If we want to have good deacons and good adult subdeacons, one method of manifesting our respect for these vocations is to provide such clerics with good vestmentss, made to fit the wearer.

Then there is the consideration that vestments are made of cloth, and are intended to be worn with some frequency. Thus they are unlikely to last forever, especially if they are not properly cared for (which is a discussion in itself). So one must be prepared - and the congregation must be prepared - to replace old vestments with some regularity. Perhaps a rotating system?

[In case you're wondering: antique vestments if they are beyond use can be given to a suitable museum, or they can sometimes be looked over carefully to see what can be salvaged from them and recycled for other vestments. In any event, they are not simply to be thrown into the rubbish; they may properly be buried in consecrated ground.]

I could continue, but time is pressing.

Fr. Serge

Father Serge,

Do you by any chance have a web site for the Moscow vestments?

While not to my taste, the vestments pictured are a DRAMATIC IMPROVEMENT to the double knit junk the local Roman priests wear. And like Fr Serge, I sort of wrinkle my nose a bit at having an icon on the back of a phelon. My tastes run more to heavy brocades and velvets, but then again, it's cold in Russia!

Alexandr

Matt 6:31-33

Here's a picture of lace and flowery white vestments.

Personally, I don't see anything feminine about them.

[Linked Image]

Alexis

What a beautiful photo! Everything is so beautiful and respectful...Garrett, do you know in what church and country this photo was taken?

Regards,
Alice

Alice, I *think* that's the London Oratory. I'll go check...

Alexis

Yeah, it's the London Oratory.

Go here to view all of the Mass pictures: http://www.traditionalcatholic.org.uk/CIEL_UK_May_2007/Introduction.html

Alexis

Dear Subdeacon,

I think there is a Sofrino web site one can reach through the Moscow Patriarchate web-site. If that doesn't work, but you speak Russian, send me a PM and I'll send you a telephone number of a place in Moscow that makes excellent vestments and similar items. If you're going to Moscow, it's adjacent to the Church of Saint Gregory of Neo-Caesarea.

Fr. Serge

If you prefer your roman style (and sometimes lace!) vestments with a history (with previous traditionalist form?) then this site is a good one; the occasional bargain too;

www.luzarvestements.co.uk [luzarvestements.co.uk]

And for a big variety of stuff and some rubbish at nicer prices should any one need decent stuff for bi ritual services, this is worth checking out;

www.cassock-u-like.org.uk [cassock-u-like.org.uk]

Ned

Thanks for the pic! Very pretty.

I don't think I ever implied that lace was effeminate. All I'm saying is: Let's just keep our priorities straight (Matt 6:31-33).

Still, after many Traditional Masses, I have to say I have come to prefer "the most beautiful thing this side of heaven," namely the Byzantine Divine Liturgy.

(BOOM! No, he dih-int!)

Brat' piddiakone Borislave:

Istok's vestments are Russian-made, although the business is in Calgary:
http://www.istok.net/home.php

I have several deacon's sets from them and have been pleased. Getting them the measurements and making sure they are correct (english/metric, etc.) is important.

So far I have ordered all my cassocks from Nikita Borisov. I've been happy with His work.

I also ordered this Deacon's Liturgical Vestment from Krista West
http://www.kwvestments.com/images_deacons/images/deacons118.jpg


I think I will order from Istok when I am ready for an Old Believer Cassock.

Yes, all of my cassocks except two are from Nikita and I have been very pleased with them. His full vestment sets are quite expensive, however, and as much as I would like to own some Istok has been much more reasonable in price.

I did order one gold and one red set from Liturgix.com which are made in Bulgaria, and both were very nice.

You can try Matushka Krista also. She makes nice stuff and is willing to do payment plans.

http://www.kwvestments.com/index.html

I thought I had posted the link to Sofrino, but it seems to have disappeared. Let me try again...

http://www.sofrino.ru

Double post deleted - Forum acting up.

I just checked the prices on sofrino.

Its REALLY overpriced IMO.

Nikita will beat those prices.

Well, Matthew, that description has also been applied to the Traditional Mass. It's all a matter of taste, really.

Personally, I love both, but I'm theologically more Western-minded and prefer the TLM over the DL (especially over Slavic DLs - just can't say I like the chants!), but certainly don't begrudge those, Latin and non-Latin alike, who prefer the DL!

Alexis

Re: Sofrino, it varies. I agree - their cassocks are rather pricey, but other items are cheaper (excluding S&H). For example, Nikita's episcopal mantyas are $1,000/$1,300 60% Cotton - 40 Acetat; while Sofrino's moire silk mantyas are a bit under $1,200.

As with all things, best to shop around.