Stays for the Very Young, c. 1770

Susan reporting:

We've discussed stays, the 18th c. version of a corset, here at the TNHG, and we've also discussed stays for young Georgian children here and here. But these are the first photographs that we've been able to share that show children's stays being worn as they would have been 250 years ago: over a linen shift, and ready for a gown to be worn over them.

The purpose of 18th c. stays was not to compress and narrow the waist, but to shape and support the figure.  Stays share none of the health perils and physical restrictions caused by the tight-laced Victorian and Edwardian corsets in the next century. While stays do rely on layers of stiffened, stitched fabric reinforced with bones of baleen, wood, or cane splints stitched into channels for their rigid shape, a correctly fitted pair should not be uncomfortable.

Both young girls and boys wore stays. The goal was to improve the posture, a way of helping achieve a straight, genteel figure. The recommended fit was likened to a fond hug. While modern parents might find the idea of stays for children horrifying, their Georgian counterparts would be equally appalled by the thought of their child being clad in the harmfully disreputable ease of a t-shirt and sweatpants.

The pair of 18th c style stays worn by the young model here was made by the mantua-makers of the Margaret Hunter shop, Colonial Williamsburg, who also kindly supplied these photographs. The photographer also reports that the model was much more interested in the day lilies than in being historically correct. For more photos, including step-by-step pictures of how the stays were constructed, please visit the Margaret Hunter Facebook page here.

Above and below: Replica child's stays in style of 1770. Photographs copyright & used by permission of the Margaret Hunter shop, Colonial Williamsburg.

Breakfast Links: Week of July 11, 2011

We’re thick in the middle of summer’s heat now, but we’re still dishing up a fresh serving of Breakfast Links for you. For your enjoyment, here’s our latest collection of links to blogs, web sites, pictures, and news stories gathered this week from the Twitterverse.

• First-person account with details of travel, inns, & meals: A Journey to Bath, 1784. http://post.ly/2NMeP

• Photographic 'proof' of fairies in 19th c garden: The Cottingley Fairies - http://tinyurl.com/62724ee

• Story you probably don't know c 1859 about John Brown’s Body, Douglass, Emerson, & Thoreau via Am. Antiquarian Soc. : http://bit.ly/rmbfcv

• Even if you can't read the text, the pix are great! Badminton in Art: http://bit.ly/oPCdpA

• No “nice girl” wore these 19^th c boots: http://bit.ly/pmFsJu

• A palatial mansion built for the ages that didn't last 50 years: Riverside House, 1906, NYC: http://bit.ly/rrVkWl

• Seeing inside antiques: Showing more strange & wonderful x-rays of objects at Knole: http://bit.ly/o6vkuM

• Pirate William Fly, much-admired by his peers, hanged in Massachusetts on 12 July 1726 http://ow.ly/5AUMf

• This extraordinary French Art Deco mural http://met.org/rhbkgK was executed for the ocean liner Normandie c 1934

• "The Man Monster": A seductive cross-dressing thief causes a furor in 19th c NYC: http://bit.ly/nqQpAn

• The Panorama: Georgian iMax http://bit.ly/b8QzYT

• "Married in fun & tied together in earnest", 1890: http://bit.ly/nnfGzP

• Navigate around London in 1827 by way of Greenwood's Map- http://ow.ly/5DSNT

• Only one wall, but likely enough to haunt Charles Dickens: Marshalsea debtors' prison remains http://tinyurl.com/65yqqy8

• To cure the plague drink marigolds and treacle - the Plague in Shakespeare's England http://bit.ly/rfLXR1

• Elegant black & cream: Historic Dress of the Day: Emile Pingat, Ball Gown, c.1860, Metropolitan Museum of Art, NYC http://bit.ly/qcvXIm

• The reverse of an C18th Australian convict love token shows a chained bird, symbolising a jail bird: http://bit.ly/n2GNru

• 18th-Century American Women - Fashion - Classic & Turquerie Costumes - http://tinyurl.com/6b9xxgv

Romantic Era fashions for real

Loretta reports:

In relation to my new book, Silk is for Seduction, I've shown a number of fashion prints (here  and here and here and here), from the time.  Like fashion illustrations now, these give a stylized view of the clothes.  I was therefore delighted to happen upon this series on YouTube, displaying real clothes by era.  This is Part One of the Romantic Era fashion show.

Feather'd Hair, 1777 and 2011

Susan reporting:

Feathers and plumes have always been a favorite way to decorate hats and hair. Fashionable Georgian ladies had a particular love for extravagant plumage. While all feathers could be stylish (there's even a description of headdresses using vulture feathers), the most desired were ostrich. Showy, fragile, and imported, the feathers were expensive, which, of course, made them all the more in demand. In 18th c. parlance, a plume was a cluster of feathers bound together at the barb, and towering white ostrich plumes on the head were actually required for English court dress.

Needless to say, the fashion didn't escape the keen eye of satirical artists. This print, left, titled The Feather'd Fair in a Fright, takes the ostrich's point of view, who is justly furious at being plucked clean of his feathers for beauty's sake.

Yet as is often the case, what's old in fashion will eventually become new. Feathers are once again turning up in stylish hair, this time in the form of colored rooster-feather extensions, a fad driven not by the royal court, but by music celebrities like Ke$ha and Steven Tyler. This time around, too, the birds have more vocal defenders in the form of the Audubon Society and PETA – though not surprisingly, the fashionistas still seem to get the last word over hapless fowl.
Above: The Feather'd Fair in a Fright by John Collet, c.1777, Lewis Walpole Library, Yale University.
Many thanks to Janea Whitacre & Sarah Woodyard for first sharing this print with me!

Adult & children's fashions of 1835

Loretta reports:

Today I'm showing another example of 19th C children’s dress.  This one, from 1835—the year of Silk is for Seduction—is the sort of thing little Lucie might wear . . . during her geography lesson.

(No. 7.) TOILETTE D' INTERIEUR—Robe de chambre of mousseline de laine; the corsage and skirt made all in one. The collar or pelerine is à revers, rounded at back and pointed on the shoulders, where it is ornamented with small tassels: this revers folds back as far as the waist in front (see plate). The sleeves are immensely full all the way down: the dress is fastened round the waist by a ceinture of itself, from which depends two long ends, finished by tassels. A small liseré or piping of blue satin goes entirely round the dress. The robe de chambre is wadded and lined.  Cap of Grecian net, with a plain round caul and double border of the same, standing up from the face (see plate): the cap is ornamented with small blue wild flowers, and bows of satin ribbon of the same colour. The hair is in plain bands. On the neck is a guimpe of fine cambric (see plate), with a single frill at top, of the same, festonné at the edge, and which, as well as the entire front of the guimpe, is small plaited; it is drawn in at the neck with a small cord and tassels. Cotton stockings, à jours and wadded silk shoes.

CHILD'S DRESS.— Frock and trousers of white muslin, the latter embroidered. The corsage à l’Enfant, the sleeves short and full. Ceinture and nœuds de page of pink satin ribbon: black silk mittens, trimmed at the tops with a ruche or quilling of tulle. The hair is divided in a point (see plate): the front hair, which is curled, falls as low as the neck; and the back hair is brought in two braids to the temples, where it is fastened up with bows of pink ribbon, to match those on the dress. Kid shoes, and gaiters of drap de soie couleur Hanneton.
— Lady’s Magazine & Museum Vol. VI, 1835

"Few virtues are of more importance to society": Cleanliness & Dr. Buchan, 1769

Susan reporting:

Seeing Queen Caroline's bath yesterday reminded me of Dr. William Buchan (1729-1805), left, last mentioned on this blog here discussing the importance of healthy perspiration. This Scottish physician became a household name in 18th c. Great Britain by writing one of the earliest bestsellers of medical advice, a straightforward volume that became the standard reference in thousands of homes. Domestic Medicine: or, A Treatise on the Prevention & Cure of Diseases by Regimen and Simple Medicines was first published in 1769, and went on to be reprinted over and over throughout the 18th and 19th c., selling an estimated 80,000 copies. Dr. Buchan was a firm believer in cleanliness and washing as promoting good health, as this excerpt demonstrates:

"Frequent washing not only removes the filth and sordes which adhere to the skin, but likewise  promotes the perspiration, braces the body, and enlivens the spirits. How refreshed, how cheerful, and agreeable does one feel on being shaved, washed, and shifted, especially when these offices have been neglected longer than usual!.... Cleanliness is certainly agreeable to our nature. We cannot help approving it in others, even though we should not practice it ourselves. It sooner attracts our regard than even finery itself, and often gains esteem where that fails. It is an ornament to the highest as well as the lowest station, and cannot be dispensed with in either. Few virtues are of more importance to society than general cleanliness. It ought to be carefully cultivated everywhere; but in populous cities, it should be almost revered."


Did all of Dr. Buchan's readers follow his excellent advice regarding cleanliness? Probably not. But then, how many modern readers of doctor-written bestsellers are following similar excellent advice regarding diet, exercise, and plenty of sleep?

Above: William Buchan, M.D., frontispiece from 1805 edition of Domestic Medicine.

Queen Caroline takes a bath

Loretta reports:

Susan & I have posted extensively about bathing. In our Annals of Bathing, We’ve looked at historical hygiene from various angles. (If you missed that investigation, you can get caught up by checking out Episodes One, Two, Three, Four, Five, and  Six.)  In the process of answering our readers’ questions, we learned that finding extant  pre-Victorian bathrooms is tricky—mainly because so many of the houses were modernized.

Luckily for us, Hampton Court Palace (I last blogged about it here) fell out of royal favor after the death of King George II’s (1682-1760) consort, Queen Caroline (1683-1737).

She, it seems was the life of the party, a cultivated, socially adept woman who amply compensated for her spouse’s unsparkling, reclusive personality.  After she died, the grieving king lost interest in Hampton Court Palace.  His successor, King George III, hated it.  Since the second George was the last British monarch to live here, it didn't undergo much in the way of transformation.  It's had a few restorations, but the rooms are much as they were then, with many of the same furnishings in their original places.

This means that, among other things, we can see a not-modern bathroom—if one takes a peek through the doors at the back of the Queen’s Dressing Room.

Queen Caroline liked to bathe—and here’s evidence that for her, this meant full-body bathing—to an extent that wasn't usual at the time in England and was considered rather strange.  The wooden bathtub is a replica.  (Note the linens lining it.)  The marble thing at the back is a cistern for cold water. 


Photos courtesy me.