All posts filed under: 20th Century

Friday Reads: Molly Make-Believe by Eleanor Hallowell Abbott

Published by The Dreamstress

I first encountered Molly Make-Believe in the December 1911 issue of the Girl’s Own Paper. I started reading it, and was utterly enchanted: the writing wasn’t genius, but the whole effect was so charming, and frivolous, and very, very period. I devoured the exposition with much mirth.  I chuckled at the introductory sentence, which rivaled the infamous “it was a dark and stormy night” (I have always dreamed of eating a vapid grapefruit, haven’t you?). I met Carl Stanton, our atypically bedridden hero, suffering from a most unromantic case of rheumatism described with writing that suffered from a most amusing case of over-use of adjectives, some most alarmingly mis-applied. I met Carl’s not-quite-fiance Cornelia: the epitome of 1910s beauty, “big and bland and blond and beautiful”,  off to warmer climes, because every girl like Cornelia must go off to warmer climes for winter, sick fiance or no. I followed along as Carl encountered ‘The Serial Letter Co’, which made me gasp in delight.  Talk about the best pen-pal ever.  I want to subscribe to all …

Terminology: What is a Cromwell Buckle (or Cromwell Shoe)?

Published by The Dreamstress

Do you love historical shoes?  I LOVE historical shoes.  After all, they combine two of my favourite things: shoes and historical fashions. For this week’s terminology post, let’s look at a a historical shoe term: the Cromwell buckle & shoe and its stylistic relatives. Basically, a Cromwell buckle is an ornamental buckle of metal (often cut steel, and sometimes nickel  or pewter) on the front of a shoe.  In addition to the sparkly cut steel the buckle might be ornamented with paste jewels.  A Cromwell shoe is obviously the shoe worn with the decorative buckle.  Cromwell shoes are generally somewhat 18th century inspired, and usually have medium to high heels. A variant of the Cromwell shoe is the Moliere shoe, which sported a slightly lower heel, and a slightly turned-up toe (though it seems likely that which you chose to call your shoe depended more on the date and your location than the actual style).  Notoriously, Moliere shoes were worn by the first known victim of Joshep Vacher: the French Jack the Ripper. Another variant …