Delineator, May 1933

This pretty outfit was drawn by Dynevor Rhys and designed for the Delineator by Goupy, "a Paris house that specialize[d] in garden party frocks".   The dress was "made in pink organza (silk organdy) with a belt of black velvet ribbon" and the hat was made from "fine Italian straw".



Celanese, 1960

These leaflets were included in an insert in the Summer 1960 issue of McCall's Pattern Fashions.  They were intended to advertise the latest "Celanese" materials available to home dressmakers - as made up in McCall's patterns.  The evening dress above is made in "leaf-printed satin of pure Celanese acetate", while the suit below is made of "Fabrex flannel of Arnel tricatetate and rayon".

Butterick Pattern Book, Summer 1954

These ladies are the picture of '50s domesticity in their summer cottons.  The photographer has even posed them behind a white picket fence!

Australian Home Journal, February 1942

Included in this issue of The Australian Home Journal were patterns for three "frocks" (including one shirtwaist, a fashionable mid-century standby).  Clothes rationing had yet to be introduced in Australia, and the dresses are cut on noticeably more generous lines cut than they would be a couple of years later in the war.

National Suit & Cloak Company, Summer 1912

Goodbye 2011!  And Hullo, 2012.  In honour of the New Year, I'm posting a page from the National Suit & Cloak Co.'s summer 1912 catalogue.  All the suits you see pictured above were made-to-measure, and cost the buyer from $13.50 for the cheapest suit in the cheapest material, up to $31.50 for the most expensive suit made in black satin!



New Idea, May 1903 (#3)

And so we come to the end of another year.  Since it's the Southern summer, and the weather has at last decided to warm up, I bring you - bathing costumes from 1903! 

Fashion in Photographs, 1860-1880 by Miles Lambert

This book was published in 1991, and alas is no longer in print.  (One of the few problems I have with Batsford is that their publications never seem to stay in print for long.)  However if you can find a copy of it secondhand, I would recommend it.

Its contents are as stated on the cover - fashions as they appear in photographs from 1860 to 1880.  The book draws on the National Portrait Gallery in London as its source, so the pictures are heavily biased toward the rich and the famous - but then again, so are most histories of fashion.  This one at least gives the reader some idea how the clothes of the era actually looked when worn, rather than how they appeared in idealised fashion plates.  (But watch out for re-touched photographs - people tampered with images long before the invention of Photoshop!)

The book is divided by decade, and further subdivided into "Men", "Women" and "Groups".  Each photograph has a lengthy caption that tells you something about the sitters, and describes the clothes they are wearing.  The author quotes extensively from contemporary periodicals in order to demonstrate how the fashion advice of the era translated into actual garments.

I've just one bone to pick - the book seems to be slanted toward the 1860s, with much more space and many more examples being given to the former decade than the latter.  Either this bias is built into the National Portrait Gallery's collections, or Mr Lambert was more interested in the 1860s than the 1870s.  Whatever the reason, it gives Fashion in Photographs a lopsided feel, and under-represents an interesting era in dress.

Published: London: Batsford, 1991.
ISBN 07134 6392 9