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Collections

Woman’s Dress1850s

On view:
Geffen Galleries, From Kashmir to Cashmere
No image
Title
Woman’s Dress
Place Made
Europe
Date Made
1850s
Medium
Cotton and wool gauze weave, printed
Dimensions
56" back neck to hem
Credit Line
Gift of B. Rich
Accession Number
M.2012.188.140
Classification
Costumes
Collecting Area
Costume and Textiles
Curatorial Notes

M.2012.188.140

Woman’s Dress

1850s

Cotton gauze weave; printed

56" back neck to hem

Gift of B. Rich

By the mid-nineteenth century, fashionable dress for European women conformed to the hourglass silhouette, defined by sloping shoulders, a corseted waist, and a full skirt. As seen in this multicolored example, dress bodices were sometimes made with diagonal pleats running from the shoulder to the lower torso to visually accentuate the small waist, an effect amplified by the dome-shaped skirt, whose long lengths of skirt fabric are tightly pleated into the waistline. Made of cotton gauze, the dress also features three tiers of skirt ruffles, supported by either layers of petticoats or the newly invented cage crinoline. Each tier is printed with a dense band of stylized paisley (buta), referencing the fashion for shawls of a woven wool textile made in Paisley, Scotland, which in turn mimicked the luxurious tapestry-woven cashmere shawls (pashm) made in Kashmir, located in the northwestern Indian subcontinent. These references are reinforced by the tassel trim on the wide pagoda sleeves and short cap oversleeves, which echo the tasseled edges of shawls.

Clarissa M. Esguerra

2024

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