Recreating every element of this luxurious edifice occupied five highly-skilled British milliners, felters, costume-makers and their assistants for weeks.

Your browser does not support this video Making the headdress. Making the headdress.

Led by Ulinka Rublack, Professor of Early Modern European History at St John’s College, University Cambridge, and Jenny Tiramani, Principal of London's School of Historical Dress, the ambitious project sought to investigate how this complex object was made, but also how it behaved when worn and what role it played in advancing Schwarz’s ambitions during a period of dramatic cultural and economic change in Europe.

The well paid German accountant commissioned this headdress for a life-changing introduction to Ferdinand of Austria, brother of the new Holy Roman Emperor, Charles V.

Ferdinand I of Habsburg on horseback by Crispijn van de Passe (I), 1604. The Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam. Ferdinand I of Habsburg on horseback by Crispijn van de Passe (I), 1604. The Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam.

“We’ve all heard the phrase ‘to put a feather in your cap’ but Schwarz took this to another level,” Rublack says. “He had to make a statement and this amazing ensemble clearly achieved that.” Tiramani adds: “When he was standing in that open field crowned with these huge feathers, you could have spotted him half a mile away.”

Schwarz wanted to stand out but also to honour Ferdinand so he demanded white and red ostrich feathers to match the heraldic colours of Austria. This strategy seems to have paid off because Ferdinand eventually made him an aristocrat.

Like so many fashion epiphanies, Schwarz experienced his in Milan – it was here that he first wore ostrich feathers. Francis I of France had just conquered the city and compelled anyone who was anyone to wear a new style of beret topped with his favourite plumes.

Schwarz marks Francis I's arrival in Milan by wearing his heraldic colours and fleur-de-lis on 11 October 1515. From the Book of Clothes. Schwarz marks Francis I's arrival in Milan by wearing his heraldic colours and fleur-de-lis on 11 October 1515. From the Book of Clothes.

After leaving Milan, Schwarz rose to become chief accountant to the hugely powerful Fugger merchant-bankers of Augsburg. With his new-found wealth, he started to commission paintings of himself wearing the latest fashions.

The result was a unique sartorial autobiography known as The Schwarz Book of Clothes which is now considered one of the most important documents in fashion history. It contains 137 images of Schwarz, the latest painted in 1560 when he was sixty-three.

The feather headdress appears in image 48 and together with other visual clues and captions in the book, this gave the London team a wealth of information on which to base their recreation.