In the context of this rapidly changing world, Rachel Worth explores the ways in which the clothing of the rural working classes was represented visually in paintings and photographs and by the literary sources of documentary, autobiography and fiction, as well as by the particular pattern of survival and collection by museums of garments of rural provenance. Rachel Worth explores ways in which clothing and how it is represented throws light on wider social and cultural aspects of society, as well as how 'traditional' styles of dress, like men's smock-frocks or women's sun-bonnets, came to be replaced by 'fashion'. Her compelling study, with black & white and colour illustrations, both adds a broader dimension to the history of dress by considering it within the social and cultural context of its time and discusses how clothing enriches our understanding of the social history of the Victorian period.
Winner of the Association of Dress Historians Book of the Year Award, 2022 Traditionally associated with rural ways of life in England, often hand-crafted and held up as one of the only items of English folk dress to survive into the 20th century, the smock frock is an object of curiosity in many museum collections. Drawing on a wide variety of sources from surviving garments to newspapers and photographs, this book reveals the hidden history of the smock frock to present new social histories. Discussing the smock frock in its widest contexts, Alison Toplis explores how garments were handmade and manufactured by the ready-made clothing industry, and bought by men of different trades. She traces the smock frock's usage across England as well as in export markets such as Australia. Following the garment's decline in the late 19th century, the book investigates how this essentially utilitarian style of workwear came to be held up as an example of disappearing 'peasant' craft in an emotional response to urbanisation, and how it was preserved by collectors under the influence of the Arts and Crafts movement. Around the turn of the 20th century, the smock frock was reinvented as both women's and children's wear and is now regularly revived in fashion collections by the likes of Molly Goddard. Drawing together extensive visual and material cultures, Alison Toplis unravels a new history of the smock frock.
This book details a significant and largely untold history of the demand for cheap, fashionable clothing for young working-class women. This is an interdisciplinary fashion and business history analysis that investigates the design, manufacture, retailing and consumption of fashion for and by young working-class women in 1930s Britain. It concentrates on new mass developments in the design and manufacture of lightweight day dresses styled for younger women, and on their retailing in the second-hand trade and seconds dealing, street markets, new multiple stores, department stores, independent dress shops and home dressmaking. The book also discusses the specific impact of this new product within the emerging mass manufactured goods mail order catalogue industry in England. These outlets all offered venues of consumption to the young, employed, modern working-class woman, and are analysed in the context of old and new businesses practices. The actuality of the garments worn by these young women is paramount to this research and will be at the forefront of all findings and outcomes.
This illustrated volume explores what fashion history can reveal about the lives of your British ancestors. As Britain evolved from an agrarian society into an urban-industrial nation, dress was transformed. Traditional rural styles gave way to modern city modes, workwear, and holiday attire. Women sewed at home, while advanced textiles and mass-produced goods brought affordable fashion to ordinary people. Many of our predecessors worked as professional garment-makers, laundresses or in other related trades—and they used those skills when caring for their own clothes. The Victorians observed strict etiquette through special costumes for Sundays, marriage, and mourning. Poorer families struggled to maintain standards while young single workers spent their wages on clothes and the older generation cultivated their own discreet style. Twentieth-century dress grew more relaxed and democratic as popular culture influenced fashion for recent generations who enjoyed sports, cinema, music, and dancing.
An abundantly illustrated overview of modern design across continents and cultures, highlighting key movements and design traditions. A unique cross-disciplinary survey of design history, A History of Design from the Victorian Era to the Present offers a concise overview of the modern milestones of architecture, interior design, graphic design, product design, and photography from the Crystal Palace of 1851 to the iPhone at the turn of the twenty-first century. This abundantly illustrated volume traces modern design across continents and cultures, highlighting the key movements and design traditions that have shaped the world around us.
Since the democratisation of the clothing industry in the early 19th century, buyers have become increasingly disconnected from the creative and human aspects of the production of clothing. Arguably clothing is now valued less for its aesthetic qualities or because of the hours spent in its making, but more for the extent to which it serves current 'fashion'. In a climate of increasing anxiety about the environmental and social impact of the contemporary global fashion industry, Rachel Worth suggests that, rather than seeking solutions only in the present, looking to history can assist in understanding better the challenges consumers face today in making decisions about the contents of their wardrobes, which, in turn, will impact on the nature of the future global fashion industry. She does not seek to offer simplistic historical solutions to contemporary problems, but explores ways in which it might be possible to bridge divides between knowledge of the past, current individual choice, and possible directions for future action. The more we know about our clothes, the less likely it is that we will wear an item of clothing only a few times before replenishing it with newer purchases that are 'on trend'. By taking ownership of our personal clothing choices rather than feeling pressurised to respond to sophisticated marketing and to 'influencers', this book suggests how we might rethink our wardrobes in philosophical and practical ways in order to create a sense of order and beauty in our lives and to wrest control back from the increasing chaos of seemingly endless choice that perpetuates unsustainable, impersonal and fast fashion.
In what ways do changing notions of social class correspond with key developments in the history of fashion? Focusing on examples ranging from 18th-century Britain to aspects of the global fashion industry in the early 21st century, Fashion and Class examines the meaning and evolution of the term 'class', from its Marxist origins to modern day interpretations. Did industrialisation, technological change and developments in fashion retailing bring about a degree of 'class levelling' or in fact intensify class antagonism? And to what extent does modern mass consumption and cheap labour revive some of the ethical issues faced in 19th-century British textile factories? Exploring a variety of case studies that examine the changing relationships between fashion and class in different historical contexts, from the French revolutionaries of the 1780-90s through to the changing relationships between couture, designer and high-street fashion in the mid-20th century and onwards, Fashion and Class is essential reading for those wishing to understand the ways in which the fashion system is closely connected with ideas of class.
This attractively illustrated new collaborative work examines dress, style and performance as a significant pleasure of fiction. It illuminates many significant factors of Victorian life. The book examines the ways in which Victorian writers, illustrators, periodicals, designers and clothing manufacturers have critiqued the social ideologies inherent in dress, fashion and imaginative engagement with clothes. This is the first volume in the New Paths in Victorian Popular Fiction and Culture series being published by EER. The series comprises specially commissioned work based on innovative or under-researched perspectives on Victorian literature and culture. As an aesthetic medium, fashion expresses a person's life course, their ideas, desires and beliefs, and fiction itself is a site where these issues can be resolved. Not only were fictional characters made recognisable through their dress, but readers of serial fiction encountered them in between adverts, cartoons, print and patterns. Thus, how dress is depicted in fiction responds to its material paratext. Victorian dress and literature equally licensed or discouraged particular forms of clothing, fantasies and moralities about men and women, as well as distinctions between generations. As a result, this volume's multidisciplinary approach engages with theoretical perspectives on dress history, periodical publications, archives and dress. The book is shaped in four distinct sections. Writers engage with fashion and material culture using an interdisciplinary methodology, as well as through fashion's multiple performances as depicted in text, image and design. Part 1, 'Fashion and Hierarchies of Knowledge' examines how periodicals, journalism and couture established 'fashion' as a discipline. Part 2's 'Artistic Engagement with Fashion's Material Culture' focuses on how fabric, printed patterns and illustrations critique social constructions of beauty and femininity. Part 3, 'Conduct and Clothing', considers novelistic depictions of fashion with regard to scientific, racial and gender identities. These are cross-related to reader consumption and behaviour. Part 4, 'Consumption and Fashionable Performance', examines periodicals, genres and drama as performative in their own right.
Whether you're investigating fashion as a material object, an abstract idea, a social phenomenon, or a commercial system, qualitative techniques can further your understanding of almost any research topic. Doing Research in Fashion and Dress begins by guiding you through a brief history of fashion studies, and the debates surrounding it, before introducing key qualitative methodological approaches, including ethnography, semiology, and object-based research. Detailed case studies demonstrate how each methodology is used in practice. These case studies include Japanese subcultures, fashion photography blogs and semiotic studies of fashion magazine shoots and advertisements. This second edition also features a new chapter on internet sources and online ethnography, reflecting the adoption of social media tools not only by industry practitioners but also by academics. By contextualizing history, theory and practice Doing Research in Fashion and Dress offers: -A systematic examination of qualitative research methods in fashion studies in social sciences. -A practical guide for anyone wishing to conduct fashion research in academia or in the business world. -An accessible grounding in contemporary fashion studies literature.
