Everyday Fashion in Found Photographs (book)
Do you shop in “Antique Stores” – and see (sometimes…) tons of “homeless” old photographs?
Do you see old photographs pop on the screen in your eBay searches, even when you searched for something completely different?
Old cartes des visites are TINY. I purchased one of Admiral Sir Michael Seymour (the son, 1802-1887). It measures about 2.5 by 3.75 inches (depending if the backing is included) – about the SIZE of a CREDIT CARD.
So I know what author Lisa Hodgkins has been collecting – and now she shares her collection and superior knowledge of what she sees in these mini portraits with us average readers!
Everyday Fashion in Found Photographs: American Women of the Late Nineteenth Century, is Lisa Hodgkin’s tour de force. It’s new to me so I will reserve a fuller review for later, but I am caught up in the photographs and the written text wherein Hodgkins explains how the American Civil War era affected women’s clothing, even the textiles available (or homemade, when required). I love reading descriptions of known items like “the cage crinoline,” the “Zouave jacket,” and the ubiquitous mourning jewelry. Even when the terms are new to me, the STYLES will be recognized by (if nothing else) the film Gone With the Wind, for instance.
What, you might ask, is a blog about the Regency Era in England doing “gushing” over old photographs from the era of the American Civil War (and beyond)??
“Children!” is my one-word reply.
I recently found a drawing, done circa 1880s, that I believe is Mary Gosling / Lady Smith’s younger daughter, Augusta Cure. Augusta was the wife of the Rev. Lawrence Capel Cure, long-term clergyman for Abbess Roding (appears also as Abbotts Roothing), county Essex. NOW I am obsessed with identifying the sitters in two images of young ladies by the same artist – identified as C.M. Moffatt. I believe I know WHO the sitters were. Of course, those two drawings are LONG sold.
BUT what grabs my attention even more are the photographs of the 1850s and 1860s (a few beyond those dates too) of the parents — Emma Austen Leigh’s siblings — and children (Emma’s nieces and nephews; and the in-laws that came along in those decades).
In reading Hodgkins’ text, and seeing through her eyes the small details of the skirt-shapes or “military”-inspired stripes, I am SEEING these FAMILY photographs, too, with new eyes. Not just searching their faces, but also admiring details of their clothing. Three albums exist (plus loose images), and the albums typically DATE as well as IDENTIFY their sitters. So date is not as important – plus the family sitters are known to me by birth-year, so some can be dated through the presumed age of the sitter.
I also recognized, LONG AFTER, that the Jane Seymour, represented in a plethora of photographs, was NOT the daughter of Maria and John Culme-Seymour, but the same-named niece, daughter of John’s brother William, who had emigrated to Australia. This little Jane Seymour came to her father’s homeland as a child! She lived with Dora and Arthur Currie. The link is to a blog post in which I discuss this annoying mistake. Annoying because, while it is GREAT having a photograph (a number of them), I still do not have a photograph of Jane (Culme) Seymour! The ONLY child of Emma’s siblings I can’t say “I know what she looked like”.
Also annoying is that I FOUND, in a faded photograph, Mary’s two daughters – Mimi (Mary Charlotte) and Augusta Elizabeth, in the 1850s, but – until the drawing surfaced – I wasn’t QUITE sure I knew which sister was which. Although, my gut instinct has pretty much been confirmed. The sister standing is surely Mimi, while the sister seated is the younger sister, Augusta. I blogged about this *FIND* and provide the link to that post. I updated the link to UCLA for that image, but (finally) post it below. Their image is No. 143.
As you can see, it’s faint — but it is a photograph, glued into an album, by the pioneering photographer, Alfred Capel Cure, in 1854. “Fixing” images was problematic in the early days. It is better than no image whatsoever. Now, thanks to Lisa Hodgkins, I wish I could see the clothing and jewelry with the clarity that the two faces (especially Augusta’s) that meet our gaze.
Everyday Fashion in Found Photographs: American Women of the Late Nineteenth Century is a fabulous book, the lessons of which help even someone like me with women who lived “across the pond,” and whose war was the Crimean War instead of the American Civil War. HIGHLY recommended, so matter your interests in 19th century fashion.
Face of a Neighbor
Inevitably, whenever _I_ find something up for sale, the sale is LONG past.
Same applies for this portrait of Joanna (Miss Cure). By the time the painting was done, circa 1850, she would have been Mrs. Philips of Heath House, Staffordshire. (She married in 1826.)
The original auction took place in April 2022, at Mellors & Kirk (see the catalogue, which currently still has pictures of the items).
A secondary sale of the portrait has also taken place (with a subsequent “hike” in price).
Emma’s diaries include visits to and from “the Miss Cures” – Joanna Freeman and Mary Caroline, the two daughters of the Capel Cure who died in 1820. Visits took place both in London and at the Cures’ home estate in Essex, Blake Hall, a “neighbor” to the Smiths’ Essex estate of Suttons. Children of their brother Capel Cure (who died in 1878) married children of Mary and Charles Joshua Smith in the mid-19th century: Augusta Smith married Lawrence Capel Cure; her brother Sir Charles Cunliffe Smith (baronet) married Agnes Capel Cure.
- see Silvy photographs of Sir Charles Cunliffe Smith and his wife Agnes Lady Smith at NPG.
- more Cures: parents Capel Cure, his wife née Frederica Cheney; their son Edward and daughter Rosamond.
One problem with the portrait, the plaque of which identifies the sitter as “Joanna Capel-Cure, 1797-1858” (which ARE the dates for Mrs. Philips), is the youth of sitter in a portrait purportedly painted in 1850. The only two “Joannas” in the family tree at this time were the sister, Joanna Freeman Cure (Mrs. Philips) and mother Joanna, born Coape (her sister Frances married William Smith MP) [the Smiths’ daughter Frances married into the Nightingale family].
Joanna Freeman Cure would have been 53-years-old in 1850. This youthful girl, with a come-hither gaze, displays no whiff of middle-aged Victorian matron.
Capel and Frederica Cure had four daughters:
- Frederica Mary, who died in 1835, aged 10;
- Rosamond Harriet, the surviving eldest sister (born 1831) [same Silvy portrait at Paul Frecker]
- Emmeline, who died, aged 19, in 1854 (born in 1835)
- Agnes Frederica, the youngest sister (born in 1836).
It’s hard not to wonder if the plaque wasn’t added, erroneously, at a later date. IF it were originally identified as “Miss Capel Cure” – that could point to Rosamond. Yet photographs of her, taken by her brother Alfred in the 1850s, shows a broader chin, a heavier face.
It is possible that Mrs. Philips acquired a portrait of her deceased niece, Emmeline. There also exists a later Cure-Philips intermarriage: ROBERT Capel Cure’s son Ernest married John Capel Philips’ daughter Frances Margaret.
Thank goodness for HEATH HOUSE!
Back in 2009 the estate was up for sale. Ruth Watson visited, as part of her show Country House Rescue. This Heath House episode is online. Forward to 2023 and the estate has sold – thus the 2022 auction of items! The TV show offers an interesting look at two generations – one only too happy to be rid of their “white elephant.” Viewer comments are enlightening. And the video – showing a magnificent house and grounds (if run-down) – is priceless for filling in with a true portrait of Mrs. Philips née Joanna Cure.
At the VERY least, here is the face of Emma Austen’s neighbor, an intimate of Emma’s youth in Essex and London. As the woman behind the building of Heath House (and probably behind much of the furnishings that came via their grand tour while the house was being built in the later 1830s), the portraits of Joanna and her husband John Burton Philips were prominently hung – you will spot them several times if you view the video. Are they still owned by the Philips family? And who is the sitter of the portrait at the head of this blog post?? WHERE does “she” live now? I would love to hear more…
Mystery of the 1794 Stock & Pudding (fashion)
There was a time when I hastened to find the solution to this mystery. Only, nothing much turned up. Things ‘cooled’; time passed.
This morning, I read from a book I bought long ago, when the diary-keeping of Elizabeth Porter Phelps, in Hadley, Massachusetts, initially caught my attention, called, Earthbound and Heavenbent: Elizabeth Porter Phelps and Life at Forty Acres, 1747-1817, by Elizabeth Pendergast Carlisle (Scribner, 2004).
Back in September, I mentioned in my blog Isadore Albee’s Civil War, (based on a series of diaries relating to the Albees of Springfield, Vermont; a future project), an earlier Vermont-related item, a Friendship Album dating from the late 1830s-early 1840s. This “Window into the Past” opened upon a different family, the wife and children of Charles Phelps of West Townshend, Vermont during a period of intense correspondence between the three young daughters – Eliza (named after her mother, Eliza Houghton), Fanny, and Jane. A main topic of conversation was of going away to school, for Eliza – who attended Mrs. Willard’s Troy Female Seminary (Troy, New York), and then Fanny – who, by dint of more numerous letters, went to schools in Chester and Brattleboro, Vermont; before leaving for the Misses Edwards’ School in New Haven, Connecticut. Isadore Albee’s early diaries frequently comment upon her desire to attend school, in order to teach. Coming approximately 20-25 years later, the Albee diaries found a ready companion in the album and batches of letters from the Phelps family because of the similarity in major topics, and how one generation would have *inspired* a future generation.
It was in looking for the duration of Eliza Phelps’ “tenure” as a scholar at Mrs. Willard’s school, and in finding only mention of the similarly-named Elizabeth Phelps Huntington (Elizabeth Porter Phelps’ daughter), that I re-plucked off the shelf Earthbound and Heavenbent. Elizabeth Porter had married an earlier Charles Phelps – in fact, the paternal uncle of “my” Charles Phelps of West Townshend. There is much in the book about Charles Phelps (of Hadley, MA), his brothers Solomon and Timothy (my Charles Phelps’ father), and their father Charles Phelps, Senior, who was living in Marlboro – and struggling hard AGAINST statehood for Vermont (admitted into the Union, as the 14th State, in 1791).
By this morning’s read, the children of the Hadley branch of the Phelps family had passed through the Revolutionary War and into the late 1790s. The only son, Porter, is in Boston, and his sister Betsy is evidently thanking him for a fashionable purchase made on her behalf:
“my pudding or neck-cloth, was not disliked tho’ ma said I should frighten some out of the house of worship — however I believe they withstood the shock — for I heard no disturbance.” [p 131; dated 18 Dec 1797]
PUDDING!
The word immediately made me scramble for the file of Smith & Gosling letters.
In a letter dated 1 February 1794, Sarah Smith (my diarist Emma’s maternal grandmother) mentions the London fashions to her daughter Eliza Chute, who always elected to remain at The Vyne, in Hampshire, despite her husband being a Member of Parliament (with one brief hiatus, William John CHUTE sat in the Commons from 1790 to 1820). While Sarah clearly describes something around the neck, I was uncertain what a PUDDING constituted in the fashionable circles of London circa 1794. Was it a fashion coming into being? Was it something fading out? The month of February would have seen the majority of country families just settled back in London. Whether related to MPs or merely moving to Town for the Season, now the parties and soirées increased in numerical intensity until Easter, and quietly wound down by June, when people left again for the country (though not necessarily their own estates).
Mrs. Smith’s letter claims as the latest fashion,
“for the Ladies either a very full Muslin plain Stock with a large Pudding, or the long cravats like your old one twisted round the neck & fastened behind”.
Words like STOCK and CRAVAT everyone knows and everyone can conjure up images – but even google got stumped over a correct description for a PUDDING. Look for it in ‘fashion’ and it is usually described as a toddler’s head-wrap, to guard against striking the head in a fall.
See, for instance, this write-up and photograph of a Pudding Cap.
Yet the idea of it being constructed of stuffed ROLLS is something to be remembered in a few moments….
Carlisle, in Earthbound and Heavenbent, in citing Betsy Phelps’ quoted letter, goes further in establishing WHAT Betsy’s “pudding” must have been:
“The word ‘pudding’ applied to a type of neck scarf derived from the nautical use of the word”. Carlisle goes on to described the nautical pudding as a “wreath of plaited cordage”. She alludes to its use on a MAST but deletes the word or words immediately after. Could the missing bit speak to the ship’s BOW? For, in googling nautical pudding, the “rope fender” protecting the BOW is the most consistent “hit”. And the subsequent photographs really point to some item that could be adapted and worn around the neck.
In just using the word FENDER in its nautical sense, (instead of Carlisle’s nondescript item for a mast that “prevent[s] chafing”), the image conjured is one of cylindrical bulk. The images found also allude to the fanciful knots that might have decorated any woman’s PUDDING. There is, however, the possibility of a couple of manifestations.
Here is a wonderful depiction, in several photographs, of what is described as a BEARD FENDER.
Mrs. Smith’s “a large pudding” could be a fall of fabric, as in the BEARD. That they were NOT the same piece of fabric is evident by her description of Eliza’s sister (Maria, Lady Compton): “Maria has made her appearance with the plain Stock but no pudding.”
Some fenders, for instance those posted to this Pinterest page, give more ideas to the type of “roll” that might have been worn around the necks of these Fashionables. The plaiting also could take on several forms. The material? Probably muslin, but not necessarily so.
the weave (above) of this bow
pudding is beautiful
this dense weave almost resembles a burlap
it’s easy to imagine:
exposed, a pudding could be decoration around the neck;
hidden under the stock, it could have added
weight or even layers to a manipulated muslin stock
If anyone has further information – especially, whether this was related to the jabot (as I tend to think of the ‘beard fender’), or truly was made of a rope material, I would welcome enlightenment upon the PUDDING as a fashion accessory for the necks of fashionable Georgian-era Ladies in London.
Are you a fan of FANS?
If you are a fan, a collector, or a costumer looking for that last accessory, check out the ONLINE offerings of The Fan Museum in Greenwich, England. For those in England, the plan is to reopen (hopefully) near the end of July 2021.
Can you GUESS why I adore the above fan??
It’s the eye cut-outs! Can’t you just see some coquette batting her eyelashes at some dashing young man, hidden behind her fan?? (I feel like I’ve been reading romances…, which I haven’t.) Click the picture to enlarge the photo.
The Fan Museum has partnered with Google Arts & Culture for a presentation space allowing many online exhibitions. One of the interesting things here is the grouping by material. Do you wish to see only Paper fans? Those made with Pearl, Bone or Nacre ribs? Do you wish to reproduce (or do you have your eye on a fan to buy?) and want to see what was “in fashion” in the 18th versus the 19th century? There are exhibitions for all of those. Even samples from “today”!
The Do-it-Yourself person will find (once they reopen, of course) that FAN-MAKING Workshops are offered with great regularity: the first Saturday afternoon of the month. Bring material (wrapping paper, for instance); sticks are supplied; as is coffee/tea and biscuits (how very British). Current price (May 2021): £40 (plus booking fee).
See the Museum’s own “online exhibitions.”
The Fan Museum’s SHOP is open 24/7 for those shopping online. Find Fans; Books; Jewelry; Stationery; Gifts.
Read the “Regency Explorer” blog post on SPY FANS, which introduced me to the Fan Museum.
Carte de Visite Photographers, UK, 1840-1940
Several years ago, I came across a GOOD STASH of Carte de Visite portraits belonging to the Smith and Gosling family (most dating, as you might guess, to the 1860s and 1870s). There were albums, put together by the daughters of Spencer Smith of Brooklands – Dora Spencer-Smith and her sister Isabella Spencer-Smith. Alas! the same “old” sittings I’d l-o-n-g seen of Emma and Edward Austen Leigh. But several of the Smith siblings (and even some Gosling grandchildren) were new to me. Thank goodness that Dora and Isabella, along with painting borders on many pages, thought to identify the sitters! Sitters included all the Austen Leigh siblings; many “in-laws” (or to-be “in-laws” of Seymours and Culme-Seymours. The *thrill* for me was to see so many photographs of the Spencer-Smiths, children of Spencer and Frances (neé Seymour).
Frances was the sister of two of Spencer’s brothers-in-law! The Rev. Richard Seymour (husband to Fanny Smith) and the Rev. Sir John Hobart Culme-Seymour (husband to Maria Louisa Smith).
I saw, for the FIRST TIME, images of Spencer and his sister Sarah Eliza (Lady Le Marchant, wife of Sir Denis Le Marchant). The time period was, sadly, too late to have images of my diarist Mary Lady Smith (neé Gosling) or the Smith sisters Charlotte (Mrs. Arthur Currie) and Augusta (Mrs. Henry Watson Wilder). Augusta had died in 1836 (along with Henry); Charlotte in 1840; Mary in 1842. Mamma (Mrs. Charles Smith; the original ‘Augusta’ – and there are lots in this family named AUGUSTA, after her), too, died before the general age of Carte de Visite photography.
Fanny Seymour – Emma’s middle sister – however I had seen already, in an 1850s “outdoor” photograph. There was a dispute as to the sitters in the picture. The archive thought it Sir John, Lady Seymour [Maria], and family. BUT: the children fit FANNY’s family more than her sister’s. An older daughter, two younger daughters, an unknown man (probably a son). I posed the probability that this photograph showed the Seymours of Kinwarton. And the albums vindicated that supposition!
It was the albums that ID’ed Fanny in a couple of lovely informal portraits, as well as a more standard, badly faded, Carte de Visite. The albums that showed the two youngest throughout their childhood and growing into young womanhood. The albums that allowed a name to be put upon the unknown man (yes, a son). Indisputable proof that the 1850s photograph showed the SEYMOURS of Kinwarton, rather the CULME-SEYMOURS of Gloucester and Northchurch.
Less successful, as far as identification went, was the pile of individual Cartes de Visite. Some had the same “view” as pasted into an album (or two). They were easy. I was pretty sure I had spotted a wonderful head and shoulders view of MARIA (Lady Seymour), mainly because there was a “companion” of Sir John – and he was recognizable from other photographs. The rear of both had the same PHOTOGRAPHER’s STUDIO. This convinced me that Maria was indeed the Lady Louisa Seymour held, in two studio views, at the National Portrait Gallery, London. The photographer in that case: Camille Silvy. (Though it still puzzles me that he would put on her picture “Lady Louisa Seymour”; see my past blog post about the ins and outs of titles and first name.)
So wonderful to SEE Maria, rather than an artist’s interpretation:
Her portrait miniature (above), by Sir William Charles Ross, was sold at auction some years ago; its background is so over-painted that the painting of it is generally more noticeable (to me) than the figure. If only they had left it alone (a large picture hat must have been painted out). John’s companion, painted about the same time, I have not seen (or found). Family letters discuss Maria’s portrait at length, including her SITTING to Ross – and Mamma thought the portrait “very like”. The ultimate compliment!
[The opposite, of course, was that the viewer thought a portrait, “NOT very like”.]
The *bonus* with the single Cartes de Visite, was the ability to see the REAR of each photo! Few identifications of sitter (Boo!). The photographer’s studio and other such identifying information – such *riches* – were present, and something I always have wanted to collate and put into a blog post.
NOW I may not have to do as much “digging”…
It was while searching for something completely different that I came across a website with a LENGTHY photographer LIST – a list of those men and women working as Photographers of Great Britain and Ireland,1840-1940.
There’s a “date your old photographs wizard” (I haven’t yet tried it), but REALLY enjoyed the summary of how the PHYSICAL photo – and yes counting clothes, hair, and props, but looking at the photo artwork and mount in particular. Biographies of photographers (a growing source of information); even some examples of a given photographer’s work. I do not know why (it could be my browser), but I cannot get the LONG list to highlight a searched-for name. Do scroll down, if the same happens to you. (For instance, I searched for SILVY – and he IS there in their list.)
A great resource to add to my “UK Archives Online” page, to which I have been adding many online sources beyond the traditional county “archives” catalogue.
Explore Barbara Johnson’s Fashions
Serena Dyer has posted her article, “Barbara Johnson’s Album: Material Literacy and Consumer Practice, 1746-1823,” from Journal for Eighteenth-Century Studies (2019) on her Academia account. This will give readers a taste of her current (edited) volume, Material Literacy in Eighteenth-Century Britain: A National of Makers (co-edited by Chloe Wigston Smith), as well as her upcoming Material Lives: Women Makers and Consumer Culture in the 18th Century.
Barbara Johnson’s book, called in its publication A Lady of Fashion: Barbara Johnson’s Album of Styles and Fabrics, is a title – photographed when it was being conserved – I had long been on the lookout for – but it’s a title that can be harder to find (and pricey). Natalie Rothstein‘s introductory chapters are fascinating. Dyer builds upon this foundation.
According to blog posts, it took me about four years to finally take the plunge and purchase it (2008 to 2012). I see I first blogged about the Album on 27 December 2008 – a prior year’s “today”!
Sewing clothes, but never one who ever looked into the construction of 18th- or 19th-century fashion, I still haven’t delved into this book in a way some friends have done. It’s size is tremendous – analogous to its beginnings as an accounts ledger – and presented as “life-size.” This past summer, when shifting around some tables, chairs, books, it found a new home on the second floor of the house – a bit more accessible, but still put to one side.
Dyer’s reintroduction makes me think to pull the Album off the shelf once again. And I’m waiting for February 2021, and Dyer’s new book (sorry, but the current book is out of my price range).
Be on the lookout for “Material Lives”
About Material Lives: Women Makers and Consumer Culture in the Eighteenth Century, by Serena Dyer:
“Eighteenth-century women told their life stories through making. With its compelling stories of women’s material experiences and practices, Material Lives offers a new perspective on eighteenth-century production and consumption. Genteel women’s making has traditionally been seen as decorative, trivial and superficial. Yet, their material archives, forged through fabric samples, watercolours, dressed prints and doll’s garments, reveal how women used the material culture of making to record and navigate their lives.
Material Lives positions women as ‘makers’ in a consumer society. Through fragments of fabric and paper, Dyer explores an innovative way of accessing the lives of otherwise obscured women. For researchers and students of material culture, dress history, consumption, gender and women’s history, it offers a rich resource to illuminate the power of needles, paintbrushes and scissors.”
From Bloomsbury, the publisher:
List of Illustrations
List of Charts and Tables
Acknowledgements
List of Abbreviations
1. Introduction: Making Material Lives
Material Life Writing
The Consumer Culture of Making
Four Material Lives
2. Material Accounting: A Sartorial Account Book
Barbara Johnson (1738–1825)
Educating Barbara Johnson
Accounting for Herself
Material Literacy
A Chronicle of Fashion
3. Dress of the Year: Watercolours
Ann Frankland Lewis (1757–1842)
Sartorial Timekeeping and the Fashion Plate
Accomplishment and Creative Practice
Society and Fashionable Display
Selfhood, Emotion and the Mourning Watercolours
4. Adorned in Silk: Dressed Prints
Sabine Winn (1734–1798)
Paper Textiles, Dress and the Dressed Print
Sabine Winn’s Dressed Prints
Print and Making at Nostell
5. Fashions in Miniature: Dolls
Laetitia Powell (1741–1801)
The Powell Dolls
Mimetic Dolls and Miniature Selves
Dolls as Sartorial Social Narrators
6. Conclusion: Material Afterlives
Glossary
Bibliography
Index
What enthuses me the most are the chapters on two women I know well by name.
Barbara Johnson (see “New Find – Old Book” and “Fashion News, Regency-Style“) produced the lovely “album of styles and fabrics” that covers so many decades of her life, from 1746 up to her death in 1825. The album was photographed during its conservation, a heart-rending tale to hear about (its condition was deteriorating, after its purchase by the Victoria and Albert, which came after its purchase by Colonial Williamsburg (Virginia) was blocked). Don’t we all hope that “we” are proper “caretakers” of items in our possession?
And the chapter on Ann Frankland Lewis must be among the first long-looks at the art (and hopefully life) of this fascinating artist. (See “Ann Lewis fecit” and “Regency Fashion, L.A. Style“.)
“Frankland” as a name is of interest to my research because of a brief mention, by Emma Smith (several years before she became Emma Austen [1828]), of “some” daughters of the Rev. Roger Frankland, a Canon of Wells. The Smiths were great friends with the Archbishop of Bath and Wells, Rev. Beadon, and spent many weeks each year visiting his family. “The Miss Franklands” were musical, and as such came to my attention while working on the book chapter, “Prima la musica: Gentry Daughters at Play – Town, Country, and Continent, 1815-1825” (for the edited volume, Women and Music in Georgian Britain). That I could locate this brother in Ann Frankland Lewis’ family proved hard work. So it’s exciting to wonder what about Lewis’ biography Serena Dyer has been able to locate.
I see that an old 2014 post, “Elite Ladies of the North,” not only mentioned Sabine Winn (chapter 4), but also had located a PODCAST about her by Serena Dyer.
The book Material Lives is due to be published at the end of February 2021, so we’ve a bit of a wait. Dyer has an edited volume – also published by Bloomsbury – just out (in the UK) or coming out (November 2020) in the US: Material Literacy in Eighteenth-Century Britain: A Nation of Makers, with co-editor Chloe Wigston Smith.
As someone who was “crafty” in her youth (and self-taught), I believe it is about time that scholars take a serious look at women artists as more than “time-fillers of too many leisure hours” and see their work as more than “merely decorative” stuff. I sewed, did needlework, knitted; at one point I loved to paint (by number, I’m afraid); and did several other “crafts.” I enjoyed doing them, and enjoyed wearing the products of my work and keen ability, and I still gaze upon old handiwork – a pillow here, a piece of art on the wall there, old sketches and fading photographs.
*Listen to a podcast of Dyer talking about her books and interests in dress and consumer culture in general; at Stitcher.
Dress in the Age of Jane Austen (review)
Hilary Davidson‘s exploration of Jane Austen’s silk pelisse fascinated (when first read in 2015) because of the thoroughness of its details. Her book, Dress in the Age of Jane Austen: Regency Fashion, grew out of this initial research.
Upon receipt, even quickly flipping through the book, I could see this wasn’t the typical “soft soap” about Regency dress. It has text (plenty of it), political cartoons and portraits, and, most importantly, photographs of actual garments. I also liked the inherent progression indicated by the outline of chapters – Self, Home, Village, Country, City, etc. A VERY GOOD out-of-the-box reaction.
First Impressions – a (long) preamble…
I quickly emailed a friend, and included a link to the google preview. We both had similar thoughts: ANY illustration on the cover but “Mrs. Q”!
- “Mrs. Q” has been put forward as the work Austen referred to when commenting: “I was very well pleased (pray tell Fanny) with a small portrait of Mrs. Bingley, excessively like her. I went in hopes of seeing one of her sister, but there was no Mrs. Darcy. … ”
Never judge a book by its cover, BUT the hackneyed illustration did put me off when Dress in the Age of Jane Austen turned up in a search for upcoming releases, months before receiving the book in the mail. There are so many books about “costume” and “Jane Austen.”
- for instance: read an old review of Penelope Byrde‘s book (reprint edition)
My friend, looking at the text online, was the first to point out “the font is so pale, more suitable to captions than main text. Or is that my eyes??”
I had to reply, that it wasn’t her eyes playing tricks, or a bad scan into google books. When I first got the book, the evening was dark and the lights were on in the house, but I needed different light to read. Instead, I looked at the pretty pictures. The paper (very nice paper) is slightly shiny, which combined with the font’s SIZE and WEIGHT does not make this volume easy to read. My friend’s later response was, “The author hasn’t been well served by the book designer.”
Another blogger’s review (Austenprose) brought up the same difficulty: “My one disappointment will be minor to some and troublesome to others. The small text is difficult to read, amplified by the choice of swirly font in gray color. I struggled to read smoothly, even with glasses.”
Illustration captions are even smaller and greyer than the main text.
In early December I read some of the book. I wasn’t making much headway with the opening chapter (“Introduction”), but did get more out of the chapter (“Home”) on underwear.
***
A little ‘Sense’ please
Along with the font, my other complaint is the bare-bones information in the endnotes. Citations list author name and publication date, which means to really look up the source, the reader has to flip from the Notes to the Bibliography. Several times I had to flip from “Secondary” to “Primary” (or vice-versa), for the Bibliography is divided into two sections (no footer or header indicates the specific section).
For instance: pp. 102/103 had in the notes “Burney, 1905” [note 20; ‘Village’] and three notes later “Edgeworth, 1971”. The Burney is an early edition of Fanny Burney’s Diary and Letters; therefore, it is found in the Bibliography under ‘Primary’ Sources. The Edgeworth, also a ‘Primary’ source, is Christine Colvin’s edition of Maria Edgeworth, Letters from England, 1813-1844. I looked under secondary sources both times, because of the dates.
An intrusion on the reading experience.
Other than ease of accessibility (a 1905 book being online), I would have thought the authoritative Oxford University Press / McGill-Queens University Press series of Burney journals and letters preferable. I finally hunted down volume V of the 1905 edition (edited by Charlotte Barrett); the quote is on page 200 (not page 199, as cited), and, finally, the pertinent information: in a letter to Mrs Lock, dated 1793. BUT: in looking up this citation I now am bothered because the story is inaccurately retold…
This is Davidson (p. 102):
Davidson’s 1905 source; Burney’s letter to Mrs. Lock (sic: Locke):
Miss Kitty and Mrs. Hamilton clearly are two different people! They are ID’ed in Oxford’s Additional Journals and Letters (vol. 1), p. 60, as Mrs. Sarah Hamilton and her niece Miss Kitty Cooke, managers of Chessington Hall, Surrey, a boarding house. ‘Miss’ Kitty and ‘Mrs.’ Hamilton (both, unmarried ladies) were, in 1793, approximately 63- and 88-years-old. I had pictured the Captain following young Miss Kitty from room to room, when in actuality he followed the maid “too quick” and caught sight of the not-forewarned Mrs. Hamilton.
If such important, albeit slight, details got away from Davidson, I wonder about other statements, conclusions, and examples. Page 102 was picked at random, today, in an effort to finish this review today (21 March 2020). I wish I hadn’t unearthed this….
- The same 1793 letter (snippet only) in Joyce Hemlow’s 1972 Clarendon Press edition, which I piece together and note that it is given the date 30 May 1793.
***
In need of some ‘Persuasion’
Davidson gives a LOT of information, but I don’t always find material well-presented. Sometimes a position is taken, but isn’t followed by explanation, enlargement, or argument/counter-argument. She moves on to another quote, another topic. I can’t call it going off on “tangents.” More, “Why include this here?”
For instance, Davidson talks about needing the services of a maid to make one’s dress “tight,” and includes a quote about the “looseness of … morning dress” when, at breakfast.
Davidson, p. 78:
I can see someone being “loose” in the Scarlett O’Hara corset sense, but I’m still unsure about being “tight.” I wanted more than just quote(s). After the novel heroine speaks of PINS — “I was again forced to comply, and stick pins into my cloaths.” — I hoped for answers. WHAT did Regency women DO with all those pins? My diarist Emma Smith (later Emma Austen Leigh) purchased many pincushions… I have images of women being as prickly as porcupines, done up with so many straight pins.
- “Regency Redingote” composed a lengthy discourse on pins – and, although it doesn’t clarify Davidson‘s commentary about being “tight” in one’s clothing, it does say what all those pins were used for during the Regency!
A stockingless, unbuttoned William Wordsworth creates its own, clear picture of a man’s “undress”; Miss Weeton, on the other hand, I determined to look up. I own the two-volume set (Miss Weeton’s Journal of a Governess), as well as the newer single-volume, Miss Weeton: Governess and Traveller, by Alan Roby.
Miss Weeton had spent the NIGHT aboard ship. She had loosened garments because she slept in them. The quote continues, “I wrapped my coat round me, and threw my shawl over it; my hair uncombed, uncurled, my face wan, and eyes sunken. I presented no very beautiful picture.” Looking like something the cat dragged in, poor Miss Weeton needed to pass muster when asking for a room at an inn. Miss Weeton’s distress is missed; the poignancy of the original, lost. This reader became no more enlightened about Davidson’s point. The long communication was best presented by words in her first paragraph.
- Re-reading these exacts, and comparing them, I’m confused: Did visitors wear “walking or visiting dresses” as mentioned on page 102, or were they in a state of “undress” when “paying morning visits,” as on page 78?
Another instance: In the chapter “Country,” which discusses outerwear and clothing adapted from the “field” or the “hunt,” there is, on the left-hand page, a full-page-wide (color) illustration of Alexander Carse’s “The Arrival of the Country Relations” (c1812). The text on the right-hand page (p. 145), referring to this, claims that the painting “contrasts two family groups, of urban and rural origins, through subtle clothing cues [endnote].” Davidson then quotes from a novel (Caroline Lismore).
I wanted to know more about the “subtle clothing cues”!
I looked up the citation – an author name and date; I looked up the Bibliography: a journal article…. I have no access to it.
Is the caption below the illustration meant to substitute for or enlarge upon the main text? “An elegant urban Edinburgh family welcomes relatives from the country. The differences in their styles of dress are subtle, but distinctly realized, the rural visitors favouring simpler, more covered clothing.”
The directive of “look at this painting; see these clues” felt unfulfilled and under-developed.
- Without seeing the SOURCE article, I can only theorize, from reading travel diaries, that “Covered” helped people stay warm, “Simpler” enabled them to shed road dust more easily; both may have benefited them at dubious coaching yards or in warding off highwaymen.
Davidson, sure and informative when discussing clothing styles, fabrics, construction, has a tendency to jump from quote to statement in a manner that did not always sweep this reader along. Often I found myself back-tracking, re-reading for something I might have missed.
Under the heading GETTING AND ALTERING CLOTHES (p. 116), the first paragraph brings up the following points:
- clothes had a high valuation
- clothes were “a considerable, infrequent investment” for the “middling and upper ranks”
- clothes were planned and discussed (i.e., mentioned in letters)
- garments were generally “bespoke”, but some were off-the-rack
- towns and villages had tailors
- for men who had “no woman to sew their linens,” ready-made or professionally-made articles “filled the gap”
- a tailor from Preston, bankrupted in 1821, had an inventory of “645 garments and accessories, 219 were men’s shirts”
- Women rarely undertook sewing “men’s outer clothing” because the skills required were not obtained by “sewing linens”
- Mary Wordsworth, working on her husband’s “‘woolen waistcoat'” may have been “knitting or working on a flannel-type garment”
- The Wordsworth women “spent a day” picking apart “his old coats for the tailor” (to serve as patterns for new garments).
There are so many topics within this single paragraph, many of which would have served the author well, if sorted out for more in-depth explanation – be it the cost of clothes (either through tailor/client records; or through criminal prosecution valuations); the use of tailors, seamstresses and others versus homemade; bespoke clothing versus the reuse of clothing (re-constructed by owner, as well as second-hand purchases) versus the good fit of a client’s well-worn piece (ie, used as patterns). Much outlined here does appear at greater length in various chapters. So why jumble, sentence upon sentence, everything in one paragraph? A red pencil, judicious rearrangement, and (self-)editing would have resolved many such annoyances.
A lack of argumentative development is especially true when a blanket historical statement is presented. If underlying, supportive facts are missing, such statements appear as generalizations, less ‘authoritative’ in tone, than the same statements supported and expanded upon.
Convoluted word order (clauses within clauses) would have benefited from being more carefully crafted: (p. 33) “Not only the bodies of Grant Tourists, but also print media – increasingly popular – disseminated ideas about classical form across Britain.” I know what the author wants to say, and means, but Davidson’s phrasing, in addition to the grey, swirly font, increased this reader’s frustration.
Long “lists,” like this on page 145, made my eyes skip lines:
“Farmers, ploughmen, carters, milkmaids, blacksmiths, beggars, ragmen, tinkers, pedlars, fishermen, thatchers, drovers, field hands, harvesters, millers, stone-cutters and -crushers, miners, coopers, masons, carpenters, chair-menders, joiners, fencers, cottagers, washerwomen and all the multitude of tradespeople…”
I usually give “less personal opinion” in a book review; there will be readers who find the authorial voice satisfactory, but I struggled, wishing for writing as engaging as the topic. Biographers sometimes pour between the covers every morsel of research unearthed, and I do wonder if the fractured flow I quibble over is a result of such “cramming.” Does it really matter what a street vendor cries out to attract customers?
If some of the verbiage had been cut, the font size could have been increased, and content and design would have united in a superior book. As it stands, it’s a bit of a Missed Opportunity. Wanting to be “all” to all comers and about all classes, from tinker to servant, from farm to manor, from city-dweller to court-regular, males and females, young and old, I do think Dress in the Age of Jane Austen an ambitious attempt. Who am I to criticize? It has so much going for it, that the pluses should outweigh the minuses.
If historical costume at all interests you, you might wish to put this book on your radar. Yale presents a 16-second “introduction”, but the best is the Google preview. Dress in the Age of Jane Austen: Regency Fashion is a sumptuous book, on a fascinating topic, filled with valuable information. It covers a broad geography and moves from intimate undergarments to all-weather outerwear. The Annie Burr Lewis Fund probably helped fund publication fees associated with the multitudinous illustrations, as well as the full-color printing. A suggested retail of US$40, Amazon currently sells it for $27 and change, which is a hardcover bargain.
A good book to ‘dip into’, I tried reading it cover-to-cover, which only increased the stress of articulating my negative thoughts about it. Very useful appendices (Austen family tree and list of characters for each novel plus two fragments, for those without other resources or prior knowledge); a stylistic Timeline of women’s gowns; a glossary. The index is almost too detailed – many entries have only one page number; for instance, I don’t foresee a need to look up hairstyle, blond. Austen’s characters should have been indexed on the page that outlines them.
Blonde, by the way, leads the reader to “Mrs. Q,” which cycles us back to the beginning of this far too long review.
three-and-a-half slightly leaking inkwells
Australian Dress Register
What IS the Australian Dress Register?
“The Australian Dress Register is a collaborative, online project about dress with Australian provenance. It includes men’s, women’s and children’s clothing ranging from the special occasion to the everyday. Museums and private collectors are encouraged to research their garments and share the stories and photographs while the information is still available and within living memory. The Register encourages people to consider their collections very broadly and share what they know about members of their community, what they wore and life in the past. This provides access to a world-wide audience while keeping their garments in their relevant location.”
I looked at ONE garment, in-depth, to be better able to tell you about the site:
A Silver & Blue shot silk dress, English (Devonshire); c1810-1813
It’s believed to have been brought from England to Australia by Ann Deane, “who arrived in Sydney in 1838 with her son Robert, daughters Ann and Mary, and nephew Edgar.”
A description of the piece gives the following useful information:
A one-piece dress in silver and blue shot silk, with a pattern of dark blue flowers. The dress has a high waist, with a square back neckline and a dropdown bib-front. The bodice interior is lined with cream cotton panels. The full-length sleeves has a gathered sleeve head and extended cuffs over hands, with silk floss-corded trim at the band. The five-panelled skirt is gathered at the centre back and designed to be worn over a small back bustle pad. A cotton tape drawstring is attached to the interior of the bodice, and there are blue silk ribbon ties at back (not the original ties).
The site answered a question I had: Why would she bring this to Australia, and not “recut” it to a more modern style? (ie, How ‘original’ is its state?) “Made of valuable silk, the dress ‘along with other items of apparel’ was bequeathed to Ann’s eldest daughter and it became a treasured family heirloom.”
Sections of the webpage are dedicated to:
- zoomable photographs – front, back, side views; as well as several showing the interior construction [note: the number of photographs differs from piece to piece; this garment was well-represented]
- a “significance” statement
- history & provenance (including any exhibition history)
- trimmings & decorations
- fiber/weave; manufacture details (hand vs machine sewn, for instance); etc.
- measurements (GIRTH: chest, waist, hem; VERTICAL: neck to hem, sleeve length; HORIZONTAL: neck opening, across back, underarm) [in millimeters, site converts to inches at the click of a link]
- garment condition
- articles & further information
(note: I could not get the ‘full screen’ to toggle; ‘home’ reverts back to entire photo)
Ann Deane is known to have been christened in Devon in November 1772. Ann (née Pidsley) married Thomas Deane in Devon in 1807. So she was a young married woman (and four of her six children were born by 1813) during the period, 1810-1813, when this dress would have been worn.
Ann Deane must have been TINY! A chest measurement less than 24 ½-inches; the back neck to hem length is just 54 ¾-inches (she probably stood under 5’5″); the sleeves, at 27 ½-inches, are already seen to go beyond the wrist.
Ann’s husband had died about a decade before her emigration.
There are MANY ways to search the Australian Dress Register site, by garment-type; by time period; by gender. There are uniforms and wedding dresses; clothing originated in many countries (Australia predominant). More being added, of course, as the site grows.
After viewing a uniform dress coat and hat once belonging to a Royal Navy Officer, 1832-1853, and because they ask people to “share”, I wondered: Do other countries offer such a REGISTRY?
What a Fabulous (online) idea! Let’s hope other countries jump on the bandwagon.
Amelia Rauser’s The Age of Undress
In yesterday’s mail, a new book that will hit stores on St. Patrick’s Day, 17 March 2020: The Age of Undress: Art, Fashion, and the Classical Ideal in the 1790s, by Amelia Rauser (Yale University Press).
216 pages; 180 color illustrations
We’ve all seen the sheer muslin gowns – marveled over the audacity of such ‘nakedness’ – and laughed at the “cartoons” Gillray, Cruickshank, or Dent produced that ridiculed the latest fashion extreme. Rauser brings together portraits and sculpture, cartoons and fashion plates to pose questions and reveal answers about the relationship between Neoclassicism, Hellenistic ideals of the sculpted female form, and fashion trends that quickly surged (and subsided) in such fashion-forward places as Naples, Paris, and London, in the 1790s.
Very welcome is the concentration on a small timeline, an in-depth exploration of clothing seen (and probably worn) by the mothers and maternal aunts of my diarists, Mary Gosling and Emma Smith (also known by their married names: Lady Smith and Emma Austen Leigh), my Two Teens in the Time of Austen. This “parent generation,” the four Erle Stoke Sisters and their friends, were single women and young marrieds in the very time period Rauser discusses.
A full review in the near future.
Two Teens in the Time of Austen 