An Early 1900s Lingerie Dress for Hot Summer Days

Loretta reports:

It’s steamy weather in New England. Nowadays when temperatures soar, we shed layers of clothing. Depending on our age and fashion sense, we wear not only fewer clothes, but skimpier ones: short sleeves or no sleeves, short skirts, short shorts.

This was not the case in times past. An Edwardian lady would faint dead away if someone proposed she go out of her bedroom, let alone go out in public, with her limbs exposed. Same goes for her predecessors.

As Isabella/Susan has shown in dress posts here and here, the solution in the past was lighter weight, airier materials.
 
For the late Victorian and Edwardian eras and continuing into the 1920s, the solution was the lingerie dress. During a visit to the American Textile History Museum in Lowell Massachusetts for Astrida Schaeffer's talk, Mentioning Unmentionables, I took photos of this fine example of a lingerie dress from the museum's collection.

I’m posting the information card from the museum, but you can find out a great deal more about lingerie dresses from this post at On Pins and Needles, which includes some lovely illustrations.

A few more examples:
1913  here
1915  here

1917  here
The dress, dated 1904-07, is the gift of Michelle Whitlow. It belonged to the estate of her great grandmother, Miriam Olive Hill.

Please click on images to enlarge.

Embellishments: Constructing Victorian Detail

Loretta reports:

Continuing my report on Astrida Schaeffer’s lecture at the American Textile History Museum in Lowell, MA: 

As promised, today we look at Embellishments:  Constructing Victorian Detail, Ms. Schaeffer’s book accompanying what clearly was a marvelous exhibition.  On display were twenty-five garments from the Victorian era, from the Irma Bowen Collection of the University of New Hampshire Museum.

The book helps explain, as described in the first chapter, “The Victorian Aesthetic Mindset.”  This is an aesthetic some some may think of as Wretched Excess or clutter, because it seems so busy to the 21st century eye.

But it reflects a time of burgeoning consumerism, expanded international connections, and the many “technologies, discoveries, and opportunities bursting out of the Industrial Revolution.”  Even without fully understanding the aesthetic, however, we can appreciate the beauty and workmanship of these garments.  This book lets us get up close and personal.

We’re treated not only to close views of design details but instructions for making them as well.  The photographs and illustrations are simply spectacular, and made me wish I had the skills to try recreating some of the adornments.  You can view sample pages here and images from the exhibition here.

Do check out the dashing Art Nouveau coat (back view second from left in first photo, front view at right of fourth and fifth photos).  That's my favorite.  Which garment do you like best?

Victorian Corsets: Some Facts & Myths—update

Loretta reports:

I had the good fortune recently to attend a lecture by historic fashion and textile expert Astrida Schaeffer at the American Textile History Museum in Lowell, MA.  Ms. Schaeffer very kindly gave me permission to take photographs of her lecture.*

As this blog’s regular readers are aware, we periodically point out fashion myths, especially those about corsets.**  However, my research area is the early part of the 19th century, not the Victorian era, so I was interested to distinguish truth from myth regarding later corsets, constructed with materials like steel and metal grommets strong enough to allow more intense tightening.

The changes were not as extreme as we tend to think.  No, the 16”-18” waist wasn’t the norm but the exception.  Ms. Schaeffer presented several images showing the waist we associate with Victorian women, and pointed out that these were not usual, but corset ads or images of actresses whose claim to fame was a teeny tiny waist.  The average woman didn’t go to this extreme.  Her corset was meant to create a smooth line under her clothing, and she came in all shapes and sizes as women do today.

Waist differences illustration source

Ms. Schaeffer also pointed out the way the corset redistributed flesh.  From the front, the waist appears narrow, especially with a great skirt ballooning out below.  But if we look at the lady from the side, she’s rather wider.  The experiment was tried with an actual human being, and the picture shows what happened.


These images, front and side, give you an idea.

 

Another false image is the Victorian woman lying or swooning on her sofa  because her corset prevents activity.  Also not true.  I couldn’t keep up with all the photographic examples, but here’s just one, of women jumping rope.  In other photos from The Happy Valley, they’re climbing fences and jumping down from them, ice skating and roller skating, running, leaping fearlessly from stairs, and so on.  As we’ve pointed out before, when you live in a world where the corset is the norm and not wearing one is abnormal, you are simply accustomed to doing everything wearing a corset.  It doesn’t debilitate you.  If you’re in the last stages of a galloping consumption, that’s another story entirely.

If all goes smoothly, I’ll have something to say at another time soon about Ms. Schaeffer’s book, Embellishments: Constructing Victorian Detail.

The gold dress, c. 1896, which belonged to Ellen Rodman Motley, is part of the museum’s extensive collection of clothing.  A small but fine selection is on view at present.

Update:  Belated credit to The Pragmatic Costumer, whose illustration above, of the waist differences was included in the lecture, but whose source I was unaware of.  Please check out her post, which is much more informative than I could ever be.

*Not wishing to be obnoxious about it, I limited photo-taking to one or two examples in each  subject she covered.
**Please click on the corsets label for more on the topic.