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Lingerie frocks from the Pictorial Review 1915 & 1916

Following on from my terminology post about lingerie dresses and lingerie frocks, here are a few more advertisements featuring lingerie frocks from the June 1915 and July 1916 issues of the Pictoral Review magazine. These illustrations show patterns sold by the American Fashion Company. The detailed images give ideas for fabrics and trim, while the simple line drawings show the basic dress lines. Pictoral Review June 1915 Pictoral Review June 1915 Pictoral Review June 1915 The simple line drawings also show other pattern variants, like the fancy puffed mameluke sleeves of 6203, instead of the simpler sleeves shown above. Pictoral Review June 1915 The July 1916 page shows fashions for spectators and sportswomen. It should be pretty clear which is which! This page is quite interesting, because it shows how garments were considered ‘frocks’ or ‘dresses’ even when they were two-piece garments. (side note, how adorable are those hats? The sculptural ribbons on the one with the plaid dress, and the little tipped-up bergere revival hat on the far right… delicious!) Check out how the …

Terminology: what is a lingerie dress or lingerie frock? (and blouse, and skirt)

Published by The Dreamstress

Tea Gowns vs. Lingerie Dresses Start searching for the ubiquitous Edwardian white cotton & lace dresses online, and you’ll quickly find a name for them: tea gowns. There are hundreds on etsy by that name. Vintage Textile uses the term. Augusta Auctions sells them in lots of three in every sale that includes 1900s garments. Those are NOT tea gowns (well, more precisely, they were never called tea gowns in any era in which this style of dress was fashionable). Or tea dresses. Tea gowns is a specific period term that refers to a a totally different kind of garment. This is a tea gown: As is this: And this. Note how different those examples are from the ones on all the sales sites? That’s because they are totally different styles of garment. Tea gowns were made of rich, heavy fabrics, often in colours, and usually featured elaborate, trailing sleeves. You can read more about them here. In contrast, the dresses called tea gowns by modern sellers are made in very lightweight, delicate fabrics, almost …

Gossard Corsets ad, The Designer Oct 1916, thedreamstress.com

Building your own 1910s & WWI Wardrobe: The Undergarments

Published by The Dreamstress

It’s less than a month until Costume College 2018, and my instagram and facebook feeds are full of people panic-sewing for the event. I’m not going this year, but all the excitement has reminded me of the talks I did last year, and how I’ve never put most of that information online. In a timely coincidence, a number of people have asked me recently what my favourite Edwardian & WWI era patterns are, and how I built my wardrobe for my Fortnight in 1916 living-history project. One of my talks at Costume College last year was ‘The Great War Wardrobe‘: an in-depth exploration of WWI era home-front fashion, along with a guide on how to build a complete wardrobe from the period. I’m still working out how to turn the fashion history side of the class into workable blog posts, but will (hopefully) get those sorted and polished soon. For now, here is a quick series on where to get patterns to make a 1910s (with a focus on 1914-19) era wardrobe. Other posts in …