Questions and answers: Part a billion
Mar. 25th, 2008 01:13 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
msmcknittingtonSo, like two weeks ago when I made the initial post asking for questions, any questions!, A Friend asked a question I have yet to answer. I shall do so today. (im in ur frends list, cloggin up ur pages)
Apparently the comments came unscreened? Maybe because I forgot to screen my replies? Nobody asked anything licentious, so I think you're all safe. If you would like your comment screened, drop me a note and I'll whisk them away. Like Calgon!
I am also open to additional questions at this time.
Anyway, the question asked was thus: What is it about historical dress that so appeals to you?
The historical costumers on my list will realize this is a huge question. Like King Kong big. I'm afraid this post might read like a girl on a rambling drunk talking about ex-boyfriends, but I shall try to refrain from talking smack about Victorian costume, which briefly lured me away from my one true love, the 16th century (the bitch).
I have always loved old stuff. For as long as I can remember. My mom got bit by the genealogy bug in the '80s, and inherited a lot of her grandmother's things, which means that I spent my pre-school years surrounded by the artifacts of a family's immigration from Germany . . . er, Prussia, actually. And then I saw Anne of Green Gables on PBS when I was in first or second grade, Mom let me have her anthology of Victorian poetry from college the year after that, I read the Little House books, started on my obsession with historical fiction, and my love for the past was set. In 1998, it was also Wisconsin's sesquicentennial, which also marked the 150th year our family had worked the farm I'm on right now, so there were a good five years there where everybody was all, "History, rah rah rah!"
So, there: History dogs me. As it does everybody who's alive, given the way time flows. The future is one way, the past is another, and we're caught in the middle. Might as well explore what we can see.
Given my consistent and persistent love of history (and all things shiny), I feel that learning about the way people dressed in the past helps me learn about people who lived in the past. Prior to basically the 1960s, and it endures to this day, clothes were huge marker of who you were in life. You can tell so much about a person by what they're wearing. So by examining/determining what a person a person would have worn, you can figure out what their day-to-day life would have been like, what their place in society was, their income, etc. I like to think of it as living archeology.
Here's where it gets kind of loopy, though I know this feeling is common among reenactors. I also feel that when I'm wearing historical clothing, it gives me better insight into everyday life of a person from that period. Like a peek inside their brains. How they moved, what the limits of that motion were, what precautions they had to take, etc. It's a slice of history that books don't really handle well. For example, many people think of corsets as a tool of oppression for women, because all women before the 1920s laced down to 18-inch waists and had ribs removed and blah blah blah. Those are all myths -- extant clothing shows plenty of waists that are in a range that would fit a slender woman today uncorseted, and extant literature shows a variety of corsets in a wide range of sizes. Also,![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
tattycat has told me that the patterns in Juan de Alcega's pattern manual (16th century) draft up to fit a modern size 8 (is that right, Kate?), which isn't ridiculously tiny.
That's a tangent. To sum up, making historical clothing lets you gain insight into the past, in a way that a book can't.
I also really like working with textiles, and historical clothing offers a greater opportunity for embellishment than modern clothing, which is generally pretty sparse on detail. T-shirt and jeans? How am I going to fit embroidery and velvet ribbon on that and maintain functionality? So historical costume is challenging and divertingand sometimes makes me want to throw things and a really good time.
Of course, wearing historical clothing also make me feel pretty, so there is that. I don't really fit into modern beauty ideal (tall, thin, and tan), being short and curvy and pale, but Victorian? Oh, hells yeah. I've got little hands and dainty ankles. Feeling pretty is probably bigger factor than anything else I've written. Knowledge? No, it's probably mostly silk and elaborate undergarments and that sense of masquerade.
I still really like living in modern times. Modern medicine can't be beat. Germ theory is great. Let's hear it for science! And freedom of religion and women working in non-menial jobs outside of the home and blue jeans and a million of other things. Whoo, modern age!
Apparently the comments came unscreened? Maybe because I forgot to screen my replies? Nobody asked anything licentious, so I think you're all safe. If you would like your comment screened, drop me a note and I'll whisk them away. Like Calgon!
I am also open to additional questions at this time.
Anyway, the question asked was thus: What is it about historical dress that so appeals to you?
The historical costumers on my list will realize this is a huge question. Like King Kong big. I'm afraid this post might read like a girl on a rambling drunk talking about ex-boyfriends, but I shall try to refrain from talking smack about Victorian costume, which briefly lured me away from my one true love, the 16th century (the bitch).
I have always loved old stuff. For as long as I can remember. My mom got bit by the genealogy bug in the '80s, and inherited a lot of her grandmother's things, which means that I spent my pre-school years surrounded by the artifacts of a family's immigration from Germany . . . er, Prussia, actually. And then I saw Anne of Green Gables on PBS when I was in first or second grade, Mom let me have her anthology of Victorian poetry from college the year after that, I read the Little House books, started on my obsession with historical fiction, and my love for the past was set. In 1998, it was also Wisconsin's sesquicentennial, which also marked the 150th year our family had worked the farm I'm on right now, so there were a good five years there where everybody was all, "History, rah rah rah!"
So, there: History dogs me. As it does everybody who's alive, given the way time flows. The future is one way, the past is another, and we're caught in the middle. Might as well explore what we can see.
Given my consistent and persistent love of history (and all things shiny), I feel that learning about the way people dressed in the past helps me learn about people who lived in the past. Prior to basically the 1960s, and it endures to this day, clothes were huge marker of who you were in life. You can tell so much about a person by what they're wearing. So by examining/determining what a person a person would have worn, you can figure out what their day-to-day life would have been like, what their place in society was, their income, etc. I like to think of it as living archeology.
Here's where it gets kind of loopy, though I know this feeling is common among reenactors. I also feel that when I'm wearing historical clothing, it gives me better insight into everyday life of a person from that period. Like a peek inside their brains. How they moved, what the limits of that motion were, what precautions they had to take, etc. It's a slice of history that books don't really handle well. For example, many people think of corsets as a tool of oppression for women, because all women before the 1920s laced down to 18-inch waists and had ribs removed and blah blah blah. Those are all myths -- extant clothing shows plenty of waists that are in a range that would fit a slender woman today uncorseted, and extant literature shows a variety of corsets in a wide range of sizes. Also,
tattycat has told me that the patterns in Juan de Alcega's pattern manual (16th century) draft up to fit a modern size 8 (is that right, Kate?), which isn't ridiculously tiny.That's a tangent. To sum up, making historical clothing lets you gain insight into the past, in a way that a book can't.
I also really like working with textiles, and historical clothing offers a greater opportunity for embellishment than modern clothing, which is generally pretty sparse on detail. T-shirt and jeans? How am I going to fit embroidery and velvet ribbon on that and maintain functionality? So historical costume is challenging and diverting
Of course, wearing historical clothing also make me feel pretty, so there is that. I don't really fit into modern beauty ideal (tall, thin, and tan), being short and curvy and pale, but Victorian? Oh, hells yeah. I've got little hands and dainty ankles. Feeling pretty is probably bigger factor than anything else I've written. Knowledge? No, it's probably mostly silk and elaborate undergarments and that sense of masquerade.
I still really like living in modern times. Modern medicine can't be beat. Germ theory is great. Let's hear it for science! And freedom of religion and women working in non-menial jobs outside of the home and blue jeans and a million of other things. Whoo, modern age!
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2008-03-25 12:51 pm (UTC)I think my favorite thing about modern times is feminine care products. I get absolutely ill thinking about what women had to deal with before Stayfresh and Tampax. Never mind the birth control pill which is a big hit in my marriage and I probably would have died in childbirth, being that Zoe got stuck and I had to have an emergency c-section. So life is definitely good for a woman today.
However, I think in terms of fashion, things have gone way downhill. Although in Europe, they have a more open mind about acceptance of age and changes in figure. I mean, sure, youth is pretty but there is something about a woman who has experience and knows how to turn a phrase. You'd never use the term elegant on a teenager. Models are downright gangly - not graceful at all.
I think the corset as oppression is just rediculous. I mean how can you get anything done with the girls just hanging around? You need to hold 'em in. No one says you have to tie it so tight.
no subject
Date: 2008-03-26 01:58 am (UTC)Yeah, I love tampons. It feels strange saying that about something that you can buy at the grocery store for less than five dollars, but tampons are awesome. And widely available contraception is pretty great, too. Let's hear it for the sexual revolution!
Current fashions don't really appeal to me. I like waists at their natural level (except in pants), so I don't like empire tops. I don't know if I'm old enough that to not be called young, though. :P
What I find amusing about the corset oppression thing is that even the dress reform movements had some form of corsetry. Corded stays, knitted ones, whatever. It's like the people who say bad things about corsets are stuck in the late Victorian period, and are only concerned about upper class women, not those who would have worked for a living. And that sucks.
no subject
Date: 2008-03-26 02:08 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-03-26 09:51 pm (UTC)It's too bad we don't live closer, I'd love to have you over for tea! :)
no subject
Date: 2008-03-27 01:25 am (UTC)Oh, that would be awesome! My sister is convinced my fate lies in getting a Boston heir to marry me*, so I can attend tea parties in Boston in enormous silk dresses.
*The result of a really giggly conversation that keeps getting referenced. We both know Boston isn't like that.
no subject
Date: 2008-03-27 12:23 pm (UTC)