Madame Ornata and I were discussing my corset collection the other day, and we came to the conclusion that costuming ought to have its own set of collective nouns.

If the animal world has a ‘charm of hummingbirds’, an ‘ostentation of peacocks’ a ‘crash of rhinoceroses’ and a ‘murder of crows’, the costuming world ought to have its own useful and descriptive set of names for those items which we costumers end up having so many of.

What do you think of the ones we have come up with so far?

• A consumption of costumes (because that is what they do to our money, spare time, and closet space!)
• A cinch of corsets
• A rustle of petticoats
• A prick of pins (and a stab of needles)
• A gather of ruching
• A bump of bustles (or, more elegantly, an architecture of tornures)
• A flaunt of ruffles
• A saccharinity of pink
• A cloy of bows
• A volume of puffs
• A flutter of fans
• An envy of vintage

This has it all…a gather of ruching, a bump of bustle, a cinch of corsets, a flaunt of ruffles, a saccharinity of pink and a cloy of bows!

Madame Ornata and I thought of the perfect collective noun for stays, but (of course!) it has completely escaped my mind at the moment.

What other collective nouns should be used for costuming?