(Part I of this series and part II, if you're not coming to this from one or the other.) Royal weddings need to be dealt with on their own, because their dress traditions differed from those of ordinary and even aristocratic women. These differences are key to understanding the context of the gown that Queen … Continue reading Before Victoria: Royal Weddings (Part III)
Category: 1740s
Before Victoria: White Wedding Dress (Part II)
So, previously I showed you a lot of examples of actual white or white-ish gowns worn for weddings, including fashion plates (as they are intended to be prescriptive of real clothing - they exist to tell you what you can/should wear); these prove at least that white was worn. Now I'm going to follow that up … Continue reading Before Victoria: White Wedding Dress (Part II)
Before Victoria: the White Wedding Dress in the 18th and Early 19th Centuries (Part I)
The history of white wedding dresses is a popular topic, and a few related narratives have built up in both popular and academic writing: Queen Victoria was the first to wear a white gown for her wedding in 1840, and women began to copy her, creating a tradition. Queen Victoria was not the first to … Continue reading Before Victoria: the White Wedding Dress in the 18th and Early 19th Centuries (Part I)
Petticoat (and Stomacher) Situations
The Facebook discussion on my last blog post was really helpful - it made me realize that I should have been much more explicit about what I was discussing regarding timeframe and class level, and I plan to update the other post to reflect that in a bit. But I also thought it would be worthwhile … Continue reading Petticoat (and Stomacher) Situations
Painting Costume Analysis: Pamela Series, Part Twelve
XII: Pamela Tells A Nursery Tale, Joseph Highmore, 1743-4; Fitzwilliam Museum M.Add.9 The whole story ends, of course, with Pamela a loving mother. Her views on child-raising are fairly sensible and modern: she insists on nursing her infants herself, she is against swaddling, and she believes that girls should be educated. This specific scene is … Continue reading Painting Costume Analysis: Pamela Series, Part Twelve
Mimic of Modes 