This months Fashion Friday is all about Corsets.
Even way out here in the West corsets were worn by ladies of all ages and social status.
This excellent discussion of the Myths about Victorian and Edwardian Corsets at A Damsel in This Dress from 2014 by Izabella of Prior Attire covers many of the common Myths.
Here is a taste of the article.
Enjoy
Victorian Society of Alberta
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 |
1851-60 blue ribbed silk corset,
Museum of London Prints.
Image Number 002188 |
“Oh my, this must hurt – how do you breathe in this?!” – Many
re-enactors, (and modern corset wearers), will recognize that
remark, whether as a comment under a picture or spoken at an event. I
have heard my fill over the last few years, when dressed in Victorian
kit, and the discussions that followed were equally interesting and
illuminating for both parties.
Recently I have been browsing through Pinterest boards looking for
images of 1895 corsets, and noticed several nice pictures – yet it was
not the pictures that captured my attention, rather the comments and
descriptions below that were even more arresting…..
Just a few examples:
* ‘They are lovely, but so uncomfortable’ ( on this pin )
* ‘This is a victorian corset which was used to create the perfect
hourglasss figure. This is gorgeous but I can’t imagine wearing it. No
wonder Victorian women passed out all the time! …They couldn’t breathe ‘
( on this )
*’Vintage 1910-1918 Fashion Corsets….women used to be laced up so
tight in these corsets that they sometimes endured cracked ribs…..can’t
imagine! All for the sake of having a tiny waist….’ ( on this pin)
*’how many ribs do you think had to be removed so the ladies could wear this torture device?’ ( on this pin)
*Talk about taking appearance to extremes! In the 18th – 19th
century, it was fashionable to either surgically remove smaller rib
bones or crush the waistline into an impossibly small size in order to
achieve a “waspish” waist. Incredibly dumb!’ ( on this)
There are more, but no doubt you get the idea…
Well, I have been wearing corsets for work and for going out for the
last 7 years – and earlier-period stays for even longer…. I have also
been making Victorian, Edwardian and modern corsets for the last 7
years ( I think I’ve made about 200 altogether) so have managed to
learn a bit about the history of corsets and their day-to-day use….
Let us have a look at a few popular myths.
1898 Print Victorian Woman Spring Toilette Fashion Clothing Costume Dress Hat
‘Their waists were tiny!’
Some of them, probably yes – there are always people with smaller
waists, especially when tight-lacing, but by no means was that the
norm.
*Extant corsets have waist measurements from roughly 18″ to 30″ or
more – and considering that they were not meant to be worn closed but
with 2″ gap, and allowing 2-4″ tissue displacement (the so-called
“squish” factor), the original waist circumference could be anything
from 22″ to 40″ or more. Jennifer from Historical Sewing explains it
very well in her own blog.
*optical illusion factor – crinolines, bustles, hip pads, bug
sleeves, sloping shoulders and V-shaped blouse cut and decoration – with
these, it was easier to emphasize the waist, which looked smaller when
contrasted with hide hips and/or shoulders.
*extant clothing and corsets are usually small – this is true, but
again, there may be several explanations for the fact that it is the
smaller items that have survived to the present day:
primo – people did tend to be just a tad shorter than nowadays – so different proportions…
secundo – and that is just my theory – it seems to me that a lot of
surviving clothes belonged to teenagers and very your ladies. I have
owned, handled and seen a great deal of the clothing with labels
pronouncing that they belonged to ‘Miss Smith’ or ‘Miss Brown’ – so at
that time mostly unmarried, young women (of course there were
exceptions). Since they were only worn for a limited time, once
young miss outgrew them, (or got married and had babies etc), they were
stored ready to be handed down as necessary to the
next generation. Clothes that were worn by grown-ups don’t seem to
survive that well – mostly because they were worn much more thoroughly,
but also because they were remodeled, restyled, etc, so that the
original gown could be used for many years.
This is just a theory, discussed with a few fellow costumiers, but
there might be a little truth to it too – I would be interested in other
people’s opinions!
*photoshop. No, really – at least the Victorian/Edwardian version of
it. Most of the fashion plates from that era are drawings. It is easy
to draw a tiny waist…. The reality however is a bit different. A quick
search on Pinterest of Google images will show just as much – or better
still, a book I happen to have here – Victorian Costume for Ladies 1860-1900,
with over 350 original photographs. Yes, there were a few tiny waists
in evidence ( and let us bear in mind that early attempts at editing
was already done – by taking the photograph, concealing unwanted bits
and taking the photograph of the retouched original – an excellent blog
post on Victorian/edwardian photo shopping by Cynthia from Redthreaded
here),
but looking at the photographs from the era you will find that the
majority of ladies are far from willowy. They look natural, with
comfortable sizes of 10-18 or more….. the book is amazing, and
recommended! Below a few snaps from the book:
Also, interestingly enough, have a look at the Victorian burlesque dancers – the lovely ladies are definitely much more substantial than our “size 0” models…..
Definitely worth a read.
Izabella posts lots of great information on her blog at Prior Attire and her FB page.
These two screenshots from Twitter address a couple of the myths as well.
