Subject: Re: Empire Gowns/corsets

Thanks for all the descriptions from Waugh, Hunnisett, etc. It sounds as if the Mantua Maker pattern of an early 19th-century corset is as well researched as it appeared to me to be. It too is a long, straightish corset, covering (and tightening up) the abdomen, with large hip gussets and smaller bust gussets. Very much an evolutionary midstep between the late 18th century stays and the 1830s-40s corsets I see in Waugh. It looks, from initial fittings, like it will achieve easily the columnar, high-busted effect that Susan Loberger and Loren Dearborn described. I can't wait to know for sure. Again, I'd be interested to know if someone more experienced has already tried out the Mantua Maker (AlterYears carries it) pattern and has any comments to share.

I agree with the difficulty present-day minds can have adjusting comfortably to an older look (the Regency/Empire era always seems to draw the most disgusted expressions from my non-history-loving friends - while I adore especially the backs of those gowns). I had trouble at first too and messed up my first Regency gown attempt by making its bodice too loose and the waistline too low at the chest wall (not to mention wearing it with a bra!). A year or so after, I gained weight to my dismay, especially in the bust area, and struggled into the gown to find the bodice annoyingly tight - and looking GREAT, or at least, rather accurate. It made for semi-sweet compensation.
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Date: Mon, 21 Oct 1996 04:38:02 -1000
Reply-To: Dale Loberger
Subject: Re: Empire Gowns

The thing I think people hate most about Empire gowns is that they are "too" low in the neckline (they can be as low as the bust point and still be quite correct, depending upon how fashionable your character is) and that they are "too" tight in the armscye/sleeve area. Add that to the lack of waistline definition and we modern folks get real confused as to how in the world this was ever seen as a flattering, liberating, much less provocative, style. You have to think like they did and remember what they were used to seeing, or not seeing, just before this style came into being. I ll elaborate on this in a minute.

First of all, re: the Folkwear pattern. It is fine, it's just often seen made out of cheap poly-cotton cloth and badly fitted, and that makes it look like some Kindergarten dress. The sleeves are set correctly, the seaming is correct, the bodice gathering centers in the front and back as many did. It is a good basic pattern, and very simple. It looks better with a corset, and looks horrible with a bra. This is entirely due to the silhouette of the period, which is perfectly easily re-created using this dress.

By the way, there are more of these becoming available Rocking Horse Farm, Period Impressions, etc. all have new 1812 /Jane Austen dresses. Watch for my own line coming Very Soon I Promise it will be available nationally under the name "Thistles and Roses Patterns for Living History." Some of them are available now, but only through me. I have farm/work dresses, as well as daygowns, a wrapper, and aprons.

Anyway, with any period dress you all know how important the right underwear can be. This is the only period I know of where there was often actually padding to *increase* the waist size, and that is a little known fact. But it's crucial if you re going to capture the look, unless your waist really is thick in relation to your bustline and your hips. (I have been so impressed with the BBC version of Pride and Prejudice because the costuming has been so meticulously built for each character s body type to give a perfect period silhouette. Watch it and you will see exactly what I am going to describe here.) First of all, I am going to assume Carol is looking to recreate an American or British 1812 look. A lot of what I am going to say here has absolutely nothing to do with the French of the period they went totally off in a different direction and a lot of what the American and English women did
was in direct rejection of the French look of this period.

OK, first of all, understand that the whole Empire line was scandalous to most eyeballs when it first appeared. Many women refused to wear it until well into the nineteenth century. Why, you ask? Well, what wasdifferent about it? What did it reveal that hadn t been seen since I don't know, help me out, you SCA folks the fourteen hundreds or something before the invention of the farthingale? HIPS!!!! All of a sudden you could actually see a woman s hips and legs moving under her gown when she gasp walked!! (Now, think of that scene when Caroline Bingley is trying to get Darcy to notice her, and she keeps walking back and forth across the room. She finally gets Elizabeth to "come take a turn about the room with me. It s so refreshing!" Still Darcy refuses to look up as she passes. Finally, she says, "won t you join us, Mr.
Darcy?" And he says, "That would defeat the object." "Whatever can you mean? We insist on knowing your meaning, sir!" And Darcy says, "Why, that your figures appear to best advantage when walking, and I might best admire them from my present position." Caroline: "Shocking! Abominable reply! Eliza, how can we punish him?")

Generally, the more conservative a woman was, the more respectable shewished to appear, the more padding she wore under the Empire gown to disguise the real shape of her figure, and make it nearly impossible to guess, it would seem, where her hips actually were located under that columnar gown. Now, does it start to make sense? Also, many more conservative woman actually wore more of a combination empire/round gown with fuller, gathered skirts instead of the flat-fronted, back-gathered silhouette popular among the younger and more fashionable. (like the older housekeepers and maids in the BBC Pride & Prejudice production). The proper resting place for the waistline of the gown was somewhere between the point of the bust and the chest wall -- ___not___ on thechest wall itself, as we might think from a first glance at the silhouette. This caused the front of the gown to ride away from the
stomach, and just skim the outer hips at the sides. The bum roll, worn for dress-up and again by respectable women more often with day gowns, disguised from the back just where the buttocks were, by causing the dress to just skim over it to the floor. It also pushed the dress away from the figure to extend gracefully behind, very often in a train. And so, completely hiding the shape of the womanly figure to all but the imaginative male eye. Still, the way a woman moved made it possible for more to be revealed about all this feminine mystery than had been in anyones memory, due to the absence of abundant gathered skirts and many petticoats. Often only one narrow one was worn, with the chemise.

Now, for the foundation or corset contrary to popular belief, women did not just "throw away" their corsets during this period. Again, I'm not talking about the French here. English and American women often continued to wear their eighteenth century corsets under these high-waisted gowns, resulting in "pleasing mounds of flesh" riding high up and out of the low necklines of these dresses, (as they did in the 18th c. face it, they were used to seeing lots of bosom) and a flat fronted torso directly below. Later, toward the end of the first decade, a straight, long-lined corset appeared, and *it* was often padded in front in a large diamond shape, to fill in a woman's naturally
concave area (at least before childbirth) below the bustline and make it appear more conical or columnar. These corsets laced up the back and had busks on either side of the lacing, and could have a busk up the front, too, but a girl with good posture could forego that. These corsets were often said to have been laced very tightly, from the bottom of the bust to below the hips, in order that the whole body be forced into a straight, columnar shape. The waist was not necessarily constricted, for to do so would disturb that columnar ideal.

So, if you re going to attempt to duplicate the 1812 line, you have to re-think your body. Realize the emphasis and focal point was the upper chest and neckline area. Everything else is meant to draw the eye upward and away from those scandalously obvious legs and hips. Decide whether you re going to be more comfortable with either pretty collars and chemisettes to fill in the low neckline or the WonderBra look. (Don't try wearing one of these, though. Bras don t work here they are much too obvious and difficult to hide, besides the fact that they don't give the right silhouette to build on.) Try it with your 18th c. corset first, remembering that the waistline of the dress does not go down below the bust against the chest wall but just above it. If you aren't satisfied with this look, you can try the 1830 corded stays Saundra
Altman has at Past Patterns but you almost have to wear it with the busk in order to avoid drooping if you have any chest at all. Fit the waistline wearing the corset or stays you plan to wear. Try things like the bum roll or chest padding if the dress doesn t seem to duplicate the incredibly smooth, columnar shape. Absolutely NO bumps or bulges allowed they all must be disguised/flattened/hidden /skimmed over. If you like trying graphed patterns, there are some stays for this period in the Norah Waugh _Corsets & Crinolines_ book. Unfortunately, there are none that I know of with the diamond shaped inset in the front, but there are pictures. Maybe you can experiment. I just read Loren Dearborn s message do you have a pattern for the regency corset you mention? Would you share???J

As to the fact that your movement is restricted even more so than you may be used to in other eras the arms are still pulled back, the chest is held up and out, the sleeves are small and tight and often don't allow you to reach your arms up to do your hair comfortably. If you have to be in something that doesn t restrict movement (such as to be able to operate a shuttle at a loom, for instance), make a fuller sleeve and add a little at the upper side seam at the armhole. Many different sleeves are available, however, besides the short, tight puffed look the marmaluke sleeve, with the series of puffs down the arm, the long, fitted sleeve that flares at the wrist, often with a separate little buckled band made of self-fabric worn over it, the elbow length tapered sleeve, with a little fullness in the upper arm, and fitted at the elbow.

As to the movement of the waistline seam, it first began rising in the late 1780 s (in France, natch) and by 1790 was definitely on the way up towards the bustline. By 1800, of course, the most fashionable were wearing it way up there, with the lowest of low necklines. It stayed up pretty high until skirts started getting fuller again toward the end of the teens. Toward the end of the 20 s it was down to between 2 & 3 inches above the normal waistline, and skirts were relatively full.
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From: Julie Adams
Subject: Bathhouse Babes (was: lacing garments and 1500 bodice)

>ANd those who have been here a while--remember the discussion about the
>'bodacious bathhouse babe' and whether they were corseted or not?
>I have found alot more illustrations with several lines down the front of
>the bodice.... and these are more clear examples that deciphering the
>white on white dress of the bathhouse girls.
>
>Does anyone think that they were rows of darts?, or boned? or?.. whatelse
>could they be?.. because they are definatly there. though it only seems
>like the front of it was treated.. not the full bodice like a corset--
>
>Things keep getting curiouser and curiouser,
>Sarahj

I found several strapless examples like the one shown this web page I set up:

http://www.idyllmtn.com/savaskan/bathhouse_babes.html

It shows a color closeup of a picture from the Wenceslas Bible, from
Bohemia, 1390-1400 of two bathhouse women washing a man's hair. The
Wenceslas Bible is thought to be medieval erotica.

The picture shows the pleats/lines going around the side too. I think it is
interesting that the bust waist fit is a lot like an 1860s corset. Has
anyone besides me ever tried on a corset with a top cut similar to what is
shown here before the boning is put in? The bust makes it flip right over.
For those of you without a web viewer, the top is cut like:

    CB ______        _________CF_________         _______CB
             \      /                    \       /
              ------                      -------
              armscye                     armscye
Can't see the back, just the front and sides. No closures are visible. The
aeriole and nipples of the bust are covered, but just barely. The garment
is not fitted tightly underneath the bust, but actually has the "dropped
in" look of an 1860's corset, with the similar pinched waist. The
interesting thing to me is that the back turn of the armscye falls right
over the shoulder blades, exactly like the ideal Victorian corset.

While most of the bathhouse shifts I've seen have had straps over the
shoulders, I think I have seen 3 or 4 strapless examples...from this Bible.
Definitely curiouser... Is this pleated or boned strapless shift a fanciful
or a real foundation garment? The spagetti strap shifts shown in the bible
are also documentable in later periods for bathhouse wear, and more
importantly as undergarments, but I haven't seen other examples of this
strapless version. Certainly shifts and other "undies" are considered
erotic in the Renaissance and Victorian times.

My gut feeling is that a linen strapless shift boned or stiffened or
pleated at the waist might work as a foundation garment to achieve the
intensely pinched waist sillouette of this period. Basically if I were
judging a contest and someone entered a Bohemian gown in this period with
this kind of undershift, and it achieved the sillouette that I think it
would, I would probably nod my head and say "very cool".

I am very interested if you found more outside of the Wenceslas Bible!

Julie Adams


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