1805 January Two Ladies In White Paris Dresses, English. Two interesting bodices, long gloves, necklaces, shawl, fan and adorable hats. Fashion Plate via The Lady’s Magazine Or Entertaining Companion for the Fair Sex, London. These are the types of outfits worn by Jane Austen and contemporaries and were seen in English magazines, where French fashions were obsessively copied despite the two countries being at war for many years.
1806 Lavender Morning Dress, French. High-waisted dress with short puffed sleeves over a white spotted bodice, Lorgnette or Looking Glass and holding a straw hat. Gorgeous spotted gloves to match the bodice. Jane Austen and her family and friends would have worn this style of dress. Fashion Plate via Journal des Dames et des Modes, or Costume Parisien.
Definition Empire Style Dress: Named after the First Empire in France. Empire dresses had a low neckline and skirts started directly under the bust and flowed into the classical relaxed wide styles of Greece and Rome. This style of dress is associated with Jane Austen and her contemporaries as a high-waisted dress was worn most days. Cotton, silk or taffeta were the popular fabrics. Only the very wealthy could afford white dress in this style as the cottons were imported from India and had to be carefully cleaned, usually by a lady’s maid.
A portrait from 1810-1814 of Rudolph Ackermann, shop owner and founder of ‘The Repository Of Arts’ magazine, The Strand, London. via National Portrait Gallery, London. Plus, an image of Ackermann’s premises in 1809. His ‘Repository of Arts, Literature, Fashion, Manufactures, etc.’ was published from 1809 to 1829 with images of Regency London, Regency furnishings and grand homes as well as beautiful fashion prints and descriptions every month. Ackermann originally supplied artists, amateur and professional, with supplies for watercolor painting. In 1799, he began manufacturing and selling his own watercolor paint blocks which were supplied by other colourmen, although at least three colors were his own mixture – Ackermann’s Green, White and Yellow. From 1817, his eldest son Rudolph Ackermann junior was responsible for the watercolor manufacturing. Ackermann also trained as a carriage designer. He began publishing prints and colour-plate books like ‘The Microcosm of London’ and ‘Doctor Syntax’ in the early 1800s.
The Repository of Arts was one the most popular magazines in Jane Austen’s time as it displayed everything ladies wanted to learn e.g. history, important country seats and houses in England, music, current events such as theatre plays, plus fashion plates and embroidery patterns. Ackermann’s shop in The Strand, London, was one of the fashionable places to shop during the Regency Era. The Repository also included poetry, travel reports, society reports and upcoming lectures. It also included serious subjects e.g. politics, legal matters, medicine and agriculture, a meteorological journal and details of the London markets. In 1817, the price of the magazine was 4 Shillings, so quite expensive for the time.
In the first issue, published for January 1809, Ackermann included an ‘introduction to the history of the useful and polite arts’ which said: “It is universally admitted, that to cultivate a taste for the arts, and an acquaintance with the sciences, is a pleasure of the most refined nature; but to do this without regard to its influence upon the passions and affections, is to ‘tear a tree for its blossoms, which is capable of yielding the richest and most valuable fruit.’ The cultivation of this taste may and ought to be subservient to higher and more important purposes: it should dignify and exalt our affections, and elevate them to the admiration and love of that Being who is the author of every thing that is fair, sublime, and good in nature.”
1823 December Red Carriage Costume, English. Gorgeous red dress with waistline a couple of inches below the bust, puffed short sleeves over long straight sleeves, wide white fur hem trim to match the white fur muff, white ruffle at the neck. High bonnet with a feather tied under the chin with a red bow. Fashion plate via John Belle’s ‘La Belle Assemblee’, England.
Definition Redingote Or Pelisse Or Walking Dress Or Carriage Dress Or Coat: French word developed from English words, riding coat. Long fitted outdoor coat worn over other garments for warmth. Often left open at the front to show off the dress underneath. Sometimes cut away in front. Originally made with several capes and trimmed with large buttons. French fashion plates call these coats Redingotes and they are designed for women, men and children. English fashion plates call them a Pelisse, a walking dress, Promenade dress, or Carriage dress. books2read.com/suzilovePelisse
1801 White Dress With Train, French. Empire style high-waisted dress under a green Spencer and carrying a gorgeous reticule,or bag, with the additional accessories of gloves and red slippers. I can picture Jane Austen and her female friends and family wearing a white Empire style dress and Spencer like this for shopping or paying visits. Fashion Plate via Journal des Dames et des Modes, or Costume Parisien.
Definition Reticule Or Bag: Purse, often with a drawstring to pull closed and usually made of cloth or covered cardboard and often decorated with beading or embroidery. Carried by a woman during the Regency period to carry all their daily necessities. in the place of pockets.
Definition Spencer: Short jacket, cropped at the waist, worn over a dress, or gown. Delicate and regency dresses provided so little protection from the cold, so over garments were essential for warmth, modesty and good health.
1800 Young Dandy’s Morning Outfit, French. Brown, doublebreated, cutaway coat, striped trousers tucked into high black boots with tassels, gloves, small jaunty hat and a walking stick. Fashion Plate via Journal des Dames et des Modes, or Costume Parisien.
Dandy: The author of The Hermit in London, a series of sketches published in 1819—1820 observed: ‘A distinguished Exquisite is padded all over to-day; and all the other foplings are, on the morrow, mere walking pin-cushions. A fat prince, or a fat dandy, requires confinement in his limbs; and all his subjects are immediately restrained within the same limits. One day, the back is to be as broad as an Irish chairman’s, and the shoulders to be bolstered up to imitate a hod-man; and the next, the shoulders are to be flat, and a man is to be pinched in and laced up until he resembles an earwig. All these are Master Snip’s maneuvers, who continues to make his bill equally long, whether the spencer or the box-coat be in vogue.
1816 October. Pelisse, English. White walking dress with wide lace hem trim worn under an aqua blue pelisse lined with spotted fur, aqua slippers, yellow slippers, white bonnet with high white plumes and aqua blue bows. Fashion Plate via Lady’s Magazine.
During the early 1800s, dress fabrics and dresses were thin, sometimes almost transparent. These lightweight white cotton dresses were fashionable in Jane Austen’s times, but they were certainly not warm when a lady was out walking or when riding in a carriage. Numerous outer layers could be added for warmth and to brighten and personalize an outfit. These might be an overdress, pelisse or redingote, hat, shawl, gloves, or large fur muff.
A typical outdoor outfit worn by the Bridgerton family, or Jane Austen and her contemporaries, when going outside consisted of an Empire style, or high-waisted, white cotton dress worn under a Pelisse, or Redingote, or coat, for warmth and with an added layer with the pretty shawl. Hats were made to match gowns and cloaks and fashionable women spent an extraordinary amount of time coordinating complete ensembles which included reticules or bags, shoes, shawls, gloves, hats, parasols, and fans. Typical Empire style dresses had low necklines and with skirts that started directly under the bust and flowed into the classical relaxed wide styles of Greece and Rome. These were worn most days and cotton, silk or taffeta were the popular fabrics.
Definition Redingote Or Pelisse Or Walking Dress Or Coat: French word developed from English words, riding coat. Long fitted outdoor coat worn over other garments for warmth. Originally made with several capes and trimmed with large buttons. For women, the coat was often cut away in the front or left open to show off the dress underneath. French fashion plates call these coats Redingotes and they were worn by men, women, and children. English fashion plates call the coats a Pelisse, a walking dress, Promenade dress, or Carriage dress.
1816 October Aqua blue Pelisse and matching hat from Jane Austen and Bridgerton years. #janeausten #bridgerton #regencyfashion https://books2read.com/SuziLoveFashionWomen1815-1819
1801 Young Man’s Daily Outfit, French. Blue cutaway coat with extra high collar, brown knee breeches, chin high white cravat, an all-over curly hairstyle and a round-hat with a wide brim and a low crown which is flat on the top. The hats only decoration is a narrow ribbon and buckle. Fashion Plate via Journal des Dames et des Modes, or Costume Parisien. https://books2read.com/SuziLoveFashionMen1800-1819
1814 April Morning Dress and Lace Cap. ‘”A petticoat and bodice of fine jaconet muslin, finished round the bottom in vandykes and small buttons. The Rochelle spencer composed of the same material, appliqued with footing lace down the sleeve, and trimmed at each edge with a narrow but full border of muslin. Double fan frill of muslin round the neck, very full, continuing round the bottom of the waist, where it is gathered on a beading of needle-work. Bourdeaux mob cap, composed of lace, with treble full borders, narrowed under the chin. A small flower placed backward, on the left side. Hair much divided in front, and in full waved curls on each side. Necklace of twisted gold and pearl, with pendant cross in the center. Spring Green kid slippers and gloves of the same.” “This dress is from Mrs. Gill, of Cork-street, to whose taste and invention this work as well as the world of fashion, are under continued obligations.” Fashion Plate via Rudolph Ackermann’s ‘The Repository of Arts’. https://books2read.com/SuziLoveFashion1810-1814
Definition Van Dyke Points: V-shaped lace and trims named after a 17th Century Flemish painter, Sir Anthony Van Dyck, known for painting V-shaped lace collars and scalloped edges on sitters.
Definition Jaconet: Cotton fabric of medium thickness made in England, lighter than shirting and heavier than mull.
Definition Muslin: Thin fabric said to take its name from Mosul or Moosul, a large town in Turkish Asia where it was first made.
Love the Bridgerton family and Jane Austen? Reader Or Writer of Regency Era stories? Mourning and riding fashion, dresses, hats, shoes, reticules or bags, underclothing and fashion accessories.
books2read.com/SuziLoveFashionWomen1815-1819
History Notes 28 Fashion Women 1815-1819: This book looks at what was fashionable for women in the Georgian Era and at the end of the Regency Era in Britain and the reconstruction in Europe after the wars. Lifestyles were freer and fashions expressed this by becoming the focus of most women’s lives. A wardrobe full of opulent accessories was requisite. Includes mourning and riding fashion, dresses, hats, shoes, reticules or bags, underclothing, and fashion accessories.
Ladies clothing in the early 1800’s featured a high waist line called an Empire Line, or Empire style dress, with a waist line just under the natural bust line and much higher than the natural waist. High-waisted Empire Line styles dominated fashions for at least three decades from the 1790s until the 1820s. The high-waisted, or short-bodied, Regency styles shifted focus away from the natural waist and so left the natural waist unconstricted, in direct contrast to previous and future styles.
Britain took these simple European styles and progressively made them more elaborate by adding more and more complicated embroidery onto white fabrics to create the white on white look popular for many years. The empire look of fine muslin dresses left women more exposed than in the Georgian Era when fabrics had been thicker and styles bulkier. Women, especially in England, preserved their modesty by adding lace, frills, flounces, ruches, and fabric plaits to dresses to adequately cover any parts that might inadvertently be exposed. Outer layers, such as Spencers, coats and shawls, were also added.
