18th century printed cotton and more...

I didn't plan to take a break from blogging but because of it, I can now proceed straight away with telling you about that museum tour. 

In fact, it wasn't at the museum at all. It was at the museum depot. The Rotterdam Museum doesn't have room in basement or attic to store items which are not on display, like many museums do. It shares a depot at the edge city with other museums from Rotterdam. It's not a place visitors usually get to see, which actually makes it more fun to have an opportunity like this.

The museum's collection slumbers, carefully packed, on endless shelves in large rooms which are kept at a temperature of 17 degrees Celsius at all time.

We came to look at items made from chintz and the sample books from the Rotterdam Cotton Company. 

The first item was this magnificent, but impossible to photograph, 18th century dress. We were looking at it with the dress lying flat on a table, great for studying all the details, not so great for pictures. 
It is made from genuine chintz, imported from India, hand-painted in a glorious, large, intricate floral design on this deep red ground. There is a repeat in the pattern but only in about a meter and even then, it isn't exact. Because it is hand work, obviously.
The dress is in a great shape, the fabric even still has its shine.

This skirt is also made from hand-painted chintz but this design seems more European in style. And the design was specifically made to be made into a skirt like this. 

On this lovely children's dress, the design is large but ordered almost like a jacquard (which is, of course, a woven fabric from Europe, usually France).

And this woman's jacket has a very small print. Still hand-painted in the same technique, but very different in look. 

Chintz became very popular in European fashion from the late 17th century onwards so it was perhaps unsurprising that factories across the continent tried to produce something similar. 
That is where the Rotterdam Cotton Company came in. Under various names, this company has existed from the early 18th century up to 1930. They did produce immitation chintz but unfortunately, those sample books are not in the collection of the Rotterdam Museum (some are at a textile museum in Twente). There were some pictures from it. Not just chintz-like floral but also abstract prints which wouldn't have looked out of place in the 1930's or even in the 1950's.

The sample books in this collection date from 1870 to 1930 and show a variety of designs. Some were for local use but many were made for export. Those are particularly interesting: Many designs mimic Indonesian batik fabrics and were made to be sold there to consumers who couldn't afford the real thing. Indonesia was a Dutch colony at the time, which made careful research and marketing possible. 
The same fabrics were occasionally also sold elsewhere, particularly in Africa. Over time, new designs were developed to appeal specifically to that market (other printing companies did the same and one which really specialized on Africa still remains today, Vlisco). 

The Rotterdam Cotton Company created its designs by block printing. Blocks were cut from wood and the fine line details were made by adding small pieces of copper. Separate blocks had to be made for each colour in the design and all blocks had to be perfectly lined up. Block printing may have been less labour intensive than hand painting or batik, it was certainly not a simple process. 

Then, there was a bit of time left to look at some more garments. 

The length of this jacket betrays its age: It has to be from the early 19th century. What looks like yet another floral print isn't a print at all though... It's embroidery, very very fine chainstitch embroidery.

This longer jacket (which was under the short one in the earlier pictures) is made from printed cotton. This one is interesting because its insides show how the bodice length has been changed in such a way that it could be changed back.

The final piece was this short cape, made from chintz with a very dark brown background. It is lined in wool of the same colour decorated with tufts of beige wool. The design looks like an imitation of ermine but in a different colour. 
The full circle cape was pieced to use the least amount of the expensive outer fabric. This was hand-painted chintz as well so it must have been expensive. Even today, the fabric has so much shine that it almost looks coated in plastic...

I hope you've enjoyed this little look in the depot. I certainly did. I suppose this is why you should pay attention to vaguely announced events held by you local museums ;)

An unusual story

Following all the 19th century fashion goodness from last week, I would like to share something I found in one of my vintage magazines. These ladies' magazines didn't just provide fashion news, housekeeping advice and knitting patterns, they also aimed to entertain and educate. In this case, they, the editors of Beatrijs magazine in 1951, have chosen to share some curiosity from the wide world...

The article is titled "An Unusual Inheritance" and its subject is the traditional costume of the women from the Herero tribe in Southwest Africa. The text is fairly limited in the information it provides and not without a light touch of casual racism.  
What mainly stood out to me were those great portrait pictures.

According to the text, the Herero were originally nomads who traveled around with their herds of cattle until control of white people over the land forced them to settle. When they did, in the 19th century, missionaries came to convert them to Protestantism. And they handed out clothes to their new converts. Clothes which had been made by women in Europe in support of the mission. Those clothes, although not high fashion, were in line with the prevailing styles at the time: The long, full, frilly skirts and buttoned-up bodices of the Victorian era. 

The style caught on with Herero women and continued to be copied over the years. It was blended with African elements and always worn with the distinctive high turban headdress (only for adult women).

Of course, I tried to find some more information about this tribe and, as usual, Wikipedia provided. As was to be expected, the interaction between the Herero and the colonizing white people didn't go as smoothly as you might think from the Beatrijs article. In fact, the tribe had a prolonged struggle with the German settlers which ended in an initially successful, but eventually brutally crushed, rebellion in 1904. 

As for clothing, there is this modern picture of ladies in colourful long dresses which seem similar in shape to those in this article. Full skirts, long sleeves with puffs at the shoulder. And headdresses which are shaped like the horns of a cow. And are nothing like the high turbans in Beatrijs. An explanation might be the fact that the Herero are not a homogenous people. Of several groups, there are two (including the largest one) which wear clothing influenced by contact with colonial European culture while other groups wear traditional leather garments. It might be that the ladies in Beatrijs belong to another group than those on the picture on Wikipedia. The other of the two. And there is little doubt that the Beatrijs story is based on those groups, not on the story of all Herero people.

The writer of the Beatrijs article seems delighted that "These black beauties still dress like our grandmothers did sixty, seventy years ago". Oddly, she doesn't seem to realize that Victorian (and slightly earlier) style lived on, in a similar way, in the traditional costumes of certain places in her own country (that link takes you to a google image search which will show what I mean).  

P.S. This is not actually related to the story of the Herero women in any way but writing this post reminded me of the work of British/Nigerian artist Yinka Shonibare. This explores, among other things, the complex relationship between Europe and Africa. Often in textile and garment (or rather, dressed dummy) form. 

Ladies' jackets in history, part 1

After all the posts about the jacket I want to make, I thought I'd try and put the garment in its rightful place in fashion history.

My dictionary (the Oxford guide to the English language, to be precise) defines a 'jacket' as 'a short coat usually reaching to the hips; outer covering'.

Going by that definition (which seems true enough anyway. Although, now that I think about it, it would, to me, also have made sense to make a distinction between jackets and coats in terms of thickness) jacket for men have been around since the late Middle Ages. And indeed, most fashion histories will describe it that way. The men's jacket we still know today has changed surprisingly little since the Victorian era. The jackets which became wardrobe staples back then, were, in themselves, merely much more sober versions of coats and jackets which had been around for much longer.

I don't think it would come as a surprise to anyone that jackets entered the lady's wardrobe as practical pieces 'borrowed' from menswear. Mostly, these were for riding or travelling.

Interestingly, women would have these items made by male tailors, who, after all, specialised in making this kind of item, while their dresses were made by female dressmakers. This distinction, although without its clear-cut gender separation, continues until this day in the workshops of traditional couture houses where the 'ateliers' are divided into 'flou' (=dressmaking) and 'tailleur' (=tailoring).

Victorian fashion sometimes flirted with elements borrowed from menswear and the separation of bodice and skirt in fashionable dress must have made this easier. Edwardian fashion pushed this a little further, with some ladies wearing actual dark suits with shirts and stock collars as day wear. However, the silhouet remained highly feminine until after the First World War.

The roaring twenties brought a new kind of woman. A woman who wasn't afraid to show her legs, to smoke, to laugh in public and who was, in many countries, now getting more rights as in individual and a citizen. She didn't just wear flapper dresses. She would also wear suits, though still with skirts.

Just look at the lady in the center of this picture.

Doesn't that look a lot like a smoking?

The 1930's with their return to a more traditional feminine silhouet, saw another kind of ladies' suit become a daywear staple. Just look at the lady on the right: it's a suit but it has a defined waist and a long sleek skirt.

At the same time, this lady shocked many with this her look.

This is Marlene Dietrich. Of course, she's famous for wearing suits. This is a typical men's style, clearly tailored to fit her perfectly. The funny thing is, I knew the story better than the picture. When I was looking for pictures for this post, and came across this one, it surprised me how much woman this lady was. I guess (even though I'm not that interested in the whole celebrity-culture and I work with real women's sizes and shapes) I'm so used to the view of super-skinny celebrities that I subconsciously assumed that this movie-star in her suit would look more like the woman in the Helmut Newton picture.

I really like Dietrich's suit. What I hope to make in the coming weeks should end up looking pretty much like it. I believe it's still a timeless piece, even after 80 years.

I think this is a good point to end this post. I'll be back later with the jackets of the 1940's and onwards.

I hope to make some progress on my jacket this weekend, but I'm not sure I'll have the time for it. I've had a nasty cold all week and I've been very busy with work.

Everything you never wanted to know about button closures

First of all, I would like to thank everyone who commented on my earlier post about the 'button-rule'. I've learnt some interesting things because of your efforts.

For those of you who haven't read their comments, I'll summerize the main points here.

- Thanks to Dora and Vibeke, it is clear that there is indeed a (Old Testament) rule in the Bible, forbidding women to wear men's clothes. As I understand it, it is part of a body of rules covering all aspects of life. Many of these were never obeyed by christians in Europe and some, like this particular one, have been interpreted differently at different points in time.

There might be a semi-religious ground for the 'button-rule' but I haven't found any evidence to support that theory.

- It was Tanitisis who found more information about the theory that women's closures were meant to prevent indecent exposure when riding (or preparing to ride) side-saddle. Apperently, most ladies ride with their legs to the horse's left. I did a quick search myself, and she's absolutely right. However, I don't agree with her conclusion that this would make the buttons gape most visibly.

As this image shows, the opening between the buttons would point to the back of the horse when sitting straight. I guess the stable boy would hold the head of the horse when the lady was getting on it, so this set-up might actually help to preserve her modesty.

Lastly, I can't believe I didn't check Wikipedia on button information before. There wasn't much on the rules for button closures. There was only a short reference to it, in the entry about buttonholes. However, one very important bit of information was added here: according to the person writing this, the maids dressing the ladies, and indeed all common women, would wear shirts which had the same kind of closure as men's shirts. Unfortunately, there's no picture, no specific example is given and there are no dates at all.

If this claim is true, it would be a strong point in favour of the 'ladies being dressed' theory. After all, it is very likely that this feature of ladies' dress would become a bit of a status symbol, which was copied by other women even though it didn't serve a purpose for them. Once adopted by a large percentage of the female population (say, in the Victorian era), it would have become a standard for the growing RTW industry.

I also learned a bit more about buttons and button closures in general. Apperently, the oldest buttons ever found are between 4000 and 5000 years old, made of sea shell and excavated in the Indus valley. There are also examples from Bronze age China and Ancient Rome. In all these early cases, a button was used as an ornament, not as fastening, it was like a sew-on broche.

The earliest functional buttonclosures are from 13th century Germany. They became a common feature on the close-fitting garments fashionable in 13th and 14th century Europe.

Although it's not mentioned specifically in the article, I guess this was mostly in men's wear because, if I remember correctly, women of that era mostly wore wide dresses with separate, laced-up stays (as pointed out in the comments, I'm not correct: stays weren't worn until the 16th century. although lacing was a normal closure on womens' garments). Unfortunately, I don't own a book on fashion history which goes back that far...

For Carolyn

In her post this morning (well, morning for me, at least), fellow blogger Carolyn posed the question of why closures on womenswear are right over left, while those on menswear are left over right.There some commonly given answers to this, and her commenters, including yours truly, faithfully provided these: 1. men dressed themselves, women were dressed, making this closure easier for their usually right-handed maids or 2. It was a decency thing, this way the person helping a lady onto her horse, or holding the animal while she was mounted side-saddle couldn't peek between the buttons of her riding clothes. Those are the ones I knew. But they raise questions. Which way would you sit when riding side-saddle? How about the closures on the maid's dress? And when did this closure-rule start anyway?

I could do something to answer the last question. I own a book on 19th century fashion, but as I had expected, all the clothes in it closed the way we would expect now: left over right for men, right over left for women.

Luckily, I own another book on historical costume: the great 'Costume in detail' by Nancy Bradfield. This book is almost literally overflowing with detailed drawings of clothes from 1730 to 1930, also showing the insides and undergarments which you normally don't get to see. I can recommend it if you're a clothing, pattern and history geek like me.

What I found there was interesting.

This ladies' riding jacket, dated between 1720 and 1750, closes left over right.

So does this unusual button-fronted stomacher from 1766.

And this coat from 1828 as well.

The jacket and the coat both seem to be utilitarian garments. Obviously cut for women, but less decorative than the fashion items of their times, obviously ment for outdoor activity and inspired by menswear in their details. Of course, the normal dress of the 18th century was open-fronted with petticoats underneath and a stomacher covering the chest between the edges of the dress. There simply were no overlapping closures in fashionable ladies' clothes. The buttoned stomacher is pictured with the comment that it's a highly unusual item.

The coat is from a time when, after a few decades of empire-line dresses, the dress waist was starting to return to the position of the natural waist. Of the empire-line items, there are no clear images showing button closures, but surplice bodices are closed left over right.

After 1835, small waists and big skirts are back and this time, they are often separated. 'Dresses' are now in many cases bodices with separate skirts. And these bodices are sometimes closed at the front, with buttons. And if so, they are closed right over left, like in this 1865 example.

So, that's it then. The 'button-rule' is apperently a 19th century invention, made when buttoned clothes for women were starting to become common for every day wear. It seems that, historically, button closures entered womenswear as a menswear inspired fashion. Much like the left over right button flies on women's jeans today (other women's trousers with fly fronts usually close right over left and what's the point of a button fly for a woman?)

They were copied as they were as long as they were only used for special outdoor kit, but it seems that when they started to be seen a lot, a 'female variation' was made.

Does anyone know whether it is really in the Bible that women are not allowed to wear men's clothes? I know people believed this in the Middle Ages, and for some time after that. It was one of the reasons Joan of Arc was convicted as a witch and a heretic. That would explain the need to differentiate. (of course I'm aware that in many christian groups today, women don't wear trousers. I just don't know where biblical law meet time-honored tradition in this case)

Well, that's my twopence on the button-rule. I hope I satisfied some curiosity, but I think I mainly raised more questions. I welcome your insight in this matter!

Petite main? Well...

At my most recent visits to my local library, I stumbled across a treasure trove of fashion history related books. Usually the really good stuff remains well hidden, or more likely is grabbed by other people first.

One of the books I'm holding on to for at least another week is the impressive catalog to the 'Golden Age of Couture' exhibit in the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, almost two years ago. I wish I could have visited the exhibition itself, but unfortunately I didn't have the time or the money to go back then. The book however is great: pictures of the dresses and suits in the museum's collection, loads of period photographs and tons of interesting information.

It is in this information that I learned some interesting facts about the inner workings of the mid 20th century couture house. I did explain to you, a while ago, that 'petite main' was a term for a couture seamstress didn't I?

Well, let me just say that the details are staggering: each couture house would have seperate ateliers for tailoring and dressmaking. A seamstress would spend her entire career in the same division. Actually, she would be expected to specialize in working with one particular material.

Coming to work as a couture seamstress, you'd have to start out as an apprentice for two to three years. Then, if your work was good, you could become deuxieme main debutante, or second hand. There were two more second hand levels before one could be promoted to premiere main qualifee, the lowest level first hand. Only after about ten years, you would reach (only if you continually and consistantly produced excellent work, of course) the position of premiere main hautement qualifee and be allowed to have full responsibility over the creation of a piece, from cutting to finishing.

Obviously, we are talking about women who worked at the atelier (workrooms where a lot of women worked literally side by side under the constant supervision of the head of the workroom) five full days a week (more when a show was coming up), all year round.

Now, I can see how far a stretch it was to adopt the name of 'petite main' for this blog. At the rate mentioned above, I might just have passed apprenticeship, which would mean I would be allowed to do some actual sewing (not just finishing) but I certainly wouldn't be trusted anywhere near the cutting table.

Maybe it's good I made that little error in my French grammer... this way, I could claim I didn't want to put my betters to shame...

Inspiration at work

Ever since I've been making patterns, I have also had a keen interest in fashion history. Although I've done a lot of vaguely 1950's dresses so far, I can't say I really have a favorite period. I also love the really old stuff (one of these fine days, I'll try my hand at serious corset making again, this time making my own pattern as well).

Something I've always wanted to try is a dress with a Watteau pleat. A Watteau pleat is the straight pleat falling down from the shoulders which you'll find in certain Renaissance dresses. The kind of dress it features in is known as 'robe anglaise' and was essentially a loose garment worn over panniers and tight stays.

I, however, don't want to make a robe anglaise, I want to make a modern dress with a Watteau pleat. The intriguing thing about this pleat (not visible in the back view in the picture) is that it's separated from the bodice of the dress by seams (keeping the bodice tight and the top of the pleat sharply shaped), but flows down to become part of the skirt.

There's a piece of fabric in my stash which I've had earmarked for this dress for over a year. Now, the pattern is done, the muslin's been fitted, so it's going to become the Watteau pleat dress!

What's in the name?

Because in may seem a bit odd to have a French name on a blog in English by a Dutch girl, I thought I should try offer some information in order to explain my choice there.

As you may or may not know, 'petit main' was the nickname for a couture seamstress in Paris. A term to describe a hard-working, highly skilled, unnamed and unfamed workforce. Literally, 'petit main' means 'little hand'. That alone shows very much how these women were seen. They are sometimes refered to in asides of fashion history.

Of Madame Vionnet for example, it told that she treated her seamstresses very well for those days. She allowed them chair with backs and provided on site child care, paid sick leave and the opportunity to take a couple of days a year off without losing pay. Knowing that these things were exeptional, just try to image how Coco Chanel, working in the same time and notorious for her temper, may have treated her 'petit mains'.

Vionnet did her most famous work in the 1920's and 30's, but the heighday of Paris couture houses, and with them of the petit mains, was in the 1950's. Even before rationing of fabric and sewing supplies had disappeared, some of the great masters of twentieth century fashion had taken the stage. Dior and Balenciaga, Coco Chanel's second time around and a little later Givenchy. The couture of those days was known not just for beauty, grace and creativity but also for its exelent fit, shape and quality. Which would not have been possible without the countless women painstakingly (hand)sewing the expensive fabrics.

Demands made to them were very different from one couturier to the other. For his New Look, Dior 'invented' a silhouet which hadn't been seen, or sewn, for about half a century. Many of the techniques needed to create this shape had to be learned based on textbooks dating back to the Victorian era. Balenciaga, on the other hand, was known for his great attention to fit. He was known to change the way the sleeves were set into a garment even after the client had taken it home.

Despite the many different houses, working days for most petit mains must have been very monotonous. To ensure to quality of each garment produced in their workshops, most houses had specialized seamstresses taking care of each step in the making of a couture dress. So one woman might be setting sleeves or making pintucks all day, every day, for years.

To me, the 'petit mains' are the unsung heroines of classic couture.

Today, reality is even more grim. Even most high fashion houses have relocated the majority of their production to countries where wages are low. Fortunately, more and more attention is now being dedicated to working conditions in the factories of fashion because from child labour to insane working hours, all the wrongs of early industrial Europe have been repeated on larger scale abroad.

At the same time, crafts have been on the verge of disappearing in the western world. In Holland nobody under 35 has learned to sew, knit or do any other kind of craft when at school. However, that was not the end. Lots of us have been learning these skills in other ways. We asked our mothers or grandmothers, took private classes or found tutorials in books or on the internet. Most of us learned some useful things, but have little time. Quick fixes, the likes of which would have horrified the seamstresses of old, are now among the most popular projects. Some of us, like me, may sometimes be hasty but at other times, we want to learn everything and make each garment we produce a work of perfection. My great grandmother was a professional seamstress before starting a family. Her daughter once told me I would have made her proud. I couldn't imagine a bigger compliment.

We are the generation of sewing, we are either sewing sauvages or sauvage seamstresses. Any way we are her to stay.