Author Archives: Mia

Madame Carven and the Beauty of the Petite Woman

May 9, 2017Posted by:

Madame Carven at her 100th birthday party at Galliera Museum, Paris. Photo courtesy Getty Images.

The couture designer Madame Carven is unfamiliar to even many enthusiasts of fashion history. Born Carmen de Tommaso, her design name Marie-Louise Carven, or Madame Carven, was known to French women since 1945 when she opened her salon in Paris offering fashions designed to show off the beauty of petite women.

At the time, Paris fashions were dominated by men such as Christian Dior, Lucien Lelong, Jacques Fath, and Pierre Balmain, who were eager to prove that couture was back after the war and still relevant. Madame Carven brought a different outlook to fashion which valued real women over muses and idealized figures. Like many other female designers before her and alongside her, she made clothes as a woman for other women. Madame Carven took as her starting point petite women like herself and her friends, understanding that size and proportion are integral to clothes that flatter. Both Edith Piaf and Leslie Caron wore her clothes. In 1950 with the launch of her pret-a-porter line she brought her aesthetic to a wider customer base.

Carven with a model in her signature dress ma griffe
Photo courtesy of Getty Images.

Her designs exude charm resulting from a care for elegance with a note of playfulness. She had a good eye for proportion and balance in a silhouette. Her approach is encapsulated in the very first dress that she sent out, a mint green and white striped full-skirted frock. Called ma griffe, or “my signature,” (also the name of her 1946 scent) the dress expressed a fresh, optimistic femininity, exemplifying the Carven aesthetic. The design elements, however, are cleverly employed to address the petite body. Her use of vertical stripes and open V-neckline elongate the body while the nipped-in waist gives womanly definition to a small frame. Almost every Carven collection since has featured a similar green and white dress as a “signature” statement.

In a 1950 Women’s Wear Daily article, Madame Carven explained her focus on petites, stating, “I decided to make haute couture outfits in my size because I was too short to wear the creations of the top couturiers, who only ever showed their designs on towering girls.” Carven herself was 5’1”. That she patented the first push-up bra in France suggests that she understood how much petite women benefit from a defined silhouette.

Carven, “Esperanto” suit, Spring/Summer 1951, Palais Galliera, Musée de la Mode de la Ville de Paris.

Carven printed silk afternoon dress, Spring/Summer 1962. Photo courtesy of Getty Images.

Carven’s designs were less fussy and stiff than some other couturiers. She eschewed the complicated formality of much haute couture. Instead, she brought an easy-care, happy sensibility to couture that fit the modern woman’s desires for clothes that were practical and pretty. The influence of ready-to-wear, washable fabrics such as synthetics, and sportswear are evident in Madame Carven’s style. Cottons were featured regularly in her collections. Fabrics such as broderie anglaise and pink gingham were also favored materials at the couture house. A 1946 editorial in American Vogue shows her sports-inspired designs of ski-style pants and lace-up ballet slippers.

Madame Carven was also inspired by her travels around the world to places such as Mexico and Thailand, often incorporating themes and fabrics from the places she visited. She even showed her collections in other countries to build an international clientele.

Antilles dress, 1961. Photo courtesy of Getty Images.

To further her brand, she engaged in many marketing and business endeavors, licensing her name in approximately 60 different ventures from a juniors line to fragrances., In 1950 she created a collection inspired by the film Gone With The Wind to coincide with its belated release in France. She also designed uniforms for various airlines, Eurostar staff and traffic wardens in Paris. Carven designed costumes for eleven films, including the classic suspense thriller, Les Diaboliques.

Though Madame Carven retired in 1993, her brand continued with different designers at the helm. In 2009 Guillaume Henry was appointed designer at Carven bringing the brand back to the forefront of fashion. The same year Marie-Louise Carven was awarded the French Legion of Honor medal for her contribution to French culture. Until the current season, the designers for Carven have been Alexis Martial and Adrien Caillaudaud, though they have announced their departure.

Unfortunately, the new iterations of the Carven label no longer cater to petite women. Many women are petite and most are not tall. Outside the fashion world, being petite has long been considered desirable in a woman. Yet “petite” lines of clothing today are the domain of mainstream workwear-friendly American retailers such as Ann Taylor and J. Crew. Such petite lines, however, only shorten the length of pants and shirts of their “regular” designs. Petite women today are implicitly told via market positioning that they are out of bounds in the high fashion arena. Madame Carven designed to specifically flatter petite women while still offering high fashion styles. Let’s hope that with a new designer the label will return to its heritage. Where is the next Madame Carven?

Further Reading

Picken, Mary Brooks and Dora Loues Miller, Dressmakers of France, New York: Harper, 1956.

Stegemeyer, Anne, Who’s Who in Fashion. New York: Fairchild Publications, 1988.

Carven Spring/Summer 2017 collection

Highlights from the Courtauld’s History of Dress Journal Archive: Femina 1951

April 25, 2017Posted by:

Mia

We are less than two weeks away from our conference Reading Fashion Magazines: Celebrating The Courtauld’s History of Dress Journals Archive! Upcoming blog posts will offer a sneak peek into ‘Addressing the Courtauld’s Fashion Magazines,’ an exhibition held in conjunction with the conference. Be sure to book a ticket here to see amazing speakers and beautiful magazines. Remember: Digital images are nice, but nothing beats seeing the real thing!

Cover of Femina, October 1951. History of Dress Collections, Courtauld Institute of Art.

Femina was a French fashion magazine active from the early twentieth century. It is a great documentary source for the history of French couture as shown by these images. During the war, Parisian couture was necessarily scaled back in its production due to a lack of material resources as well as customers. Fashion, however, was often a way for the women of Paris to resist the occupation of their city by asserting nationalistic pride through the cultural tradition of high fashion. After the war, Christian Dior asserted a return to luxuriant and grand femininity with his “New Look” collection of 1947 featuring narrow sloped shoulders, hand-span waists, and voluminous longer skirts. Although some people were shocked and even dismayed at what seemed an excessive use of fabric, the silhouette was largely embraced by women happy to have a change that expressed beauty and luxury.

Illustration of a Christian Dior gown. History of Dress Collections, Courtauld Institute of Art.

By 1951, as these illustrations attest to, the New Look silhouette was an integral part of fashion. Dior’s gown features a blue back panel with bow that is reminiscent of the earlier nineteenth century bustle emphasizing the back of the skirt. This silhouette was very consciously a return to the history of dress from the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries which Dior felt celebrated femininity in a way that resonated in the post-war period.

Illustration of a Nina Ricci gown. History of Dress Collections, Courtauld Institute of Art.

Nina Ricci was one of many female couturiers before the war who opened her house in 1932. Though she isn’t as well remembered today as Dior, she was a great success in the thirties and after the war, designing until 1954 when her son took over the business. The gown illustrated here exemplifies Ricci’s aesthetic of a highly refined femininity infused with romantic details. The caption refers to the Second Empire period in mid-nineteenth century France which the gown seems to revivify in its sweeping trained skirt and oversized bow emphasizing the hips. By contrast, the waist appears even smaller. The matching long evening gloves also continue a fashion tradition in eveningwear. The model’s coiffure, however, is a modern post-war style which reminds us that fashion is always a blend of past and present.

What I love so much about these illustrations is the way they capture a sense of drama from the dress itself. Photographs often rely upon the model and settings to create a fuller scenario but illustrations really focus on the silhouette and textures of the garment. The shading on the Dior gown conveys the stiffness of the material and the sheen of a silk. That I can “feel” the surface and shape of the dress is what draws me in. In a sense, the drawing convinces me that the gown is real, that fashion is real, because it connects to what I already know in part – the textures, colors, and shape, but offers the possibility of even more – the actual dress.

The mark of the artist’s hand speaks to the agency of my own hands and the knowledge they quite literally hold. The architectural quality of the gown can be felt with just a few lines in the right place. By contrast, the more fluid, softer drape of Nina Ricci’s gown seems to telegraph the movements of the woman’s body. I can imagine the train swaying in echo of her hips as she glides across the ballroom. The illustrations heighten the sensuality of the gowns. The differences in aesthetic qualities reflect the type of woman imagined as the wearer and express the designer’s vision of her desires.

Horrockses Fashions: Fun, Feminine, Fifties

March 7, 2017Posted by:

Mia

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Vogue UK February 1949. Image courtesy of lancashirebusinessreview.co.uk

If the thought of summer dressing makes you think of cotton floral frocks with full swingy skirts you may have Horrockses to thank for that image. One of the most popular dress lines in Britain and in America in the late 40s and 50s, Horrockses Fashions was known for its cotton prints manufactured in their own mill in Preston, Lancashire. The mill dated back to 1791 and by the early 20^th century was established as a trusted manufacturer of cotton goods, mostly household linens. To expand their sales of manufactured goods into the lucrative fashion market, the parent company Horrockses, Crewdson & Co. Limited launched the Horrockses Fashions ready-to-wear line in 1946. Horrockses had the goal of increasing desirability for their fabrics and then satisfying the demand with their own products. Their vertically integrated business model ensured commerce at multiple points in the market.

Horrockses dress with bows, 1951-58, Bowes Museum

Horrockses Fashions were best known for their day dresses though they also produced housecoats, beachwear, and evening dresses. As these examples show, there came to be a distinctive Horrockses silhouette for the dresses consisting of full skirts, tailored bodices, and defined waists which shows the influence of Christian Dior’s New Look that debuted in 1947. Floral patterns, particularly roses, bows, and bands of print or bayadere, were signature motifs repeated every season which also borrowed heavily from Dior’s aesthetic.

Horrockses dress with bayadere design, 1953, V&A

To mitigate against the low-end connotations of mass-produced clothing, Horrockses carefully followed the lines, silhouettes and trends of the couture collections shown in Paris and London. Cottons were accessible fabrics that had the weight and drape to create the New Look silhouette but with a softer, more casual result. The dresses were made of high-quality cottons which were washable much like synthetics on the market. Horrockses thus combined the easy-care of sportswear with tailored, sophisticated cuts associated with couture to bring the consumer “the best of both worlds.”

Horrockses evening dress featured in Vogue, January 1956

Horrockses Fashions differed from Dior and other couture houses in their frequent use of bright, playful prints which were generally highly stylized and abstract. The company avoided unsophisticated connotations with their prints by aligning them with art, using exclusive designs by leading British artists including Eduardo Paolozzi, Graham Sutherland, and Alastair Morton.

pp. 96-7 of Horrockses Fashions: Off-the Peg Style in the 40s and 50s showing a design by Eduardo Paolozzi

At the symbolic level, voluminous skirts signalled plenty while the summery florals bring associations of vacations, resort, and weekend leisure which put the dresses at a clear remove from workwear. Instead, Horrockses dresses correlated escape, fun, and exuberance with style, elegance, and femininity. In the British post-war context, with rationing still in place into the early 1950s, Horrockses dresses were viewed as a splurge for an occasion such as a honeymoon. In the American import context, however, Horrockses Fashions fit in perfectly with the broader cultural landscape of social change in the 1950s when the country prospered economically and disposable income increased across class strata. The economic boom brought increased choices in manufactured goods which in turn increased consumerism. An accompanying urban out-migration led to the rapid development of suburbs and the American dream of home-ownership became a reality for many. Suburban houses came with front lawns and backyards where barbeques, pool parties, and gardening took place, providing a lifestyle scenario complementary to the look of Horrockses dresses.

Horrockses advertisement, Vogue, June 1950. Image from Christine Boydell, Horrockses Fashions: : Off-the-Peg Style in the 40s and 50s

The colourful aesthetic of Horrockses Fashions reflects the circulation of intensely saturated color images in print and film due to Kodachrome and Technicolor processes. The wide scale of the skirts, too, abundant with fabric, seem to reflect the various widescreen film formats that enticed audiences into movie theatres and drive-ins to see historical epics, westerns, and melodramas. Full-skirted, brightly-colored, patterned dresses such as those of Horrockses are like costumes for living life as it was depicted on screen: monumental, colourful, dramatic.

Model Barbara Gaolen in a Horrockses evening gown, Vogue October 1952

Horrockses dresses typically were produced in runs of 1,000-1,500. Despite being mass-produced, the Horrockses ready-to-wear line had an air of exclusivity established through use of select retailers, exclusive prints, quality fabric, and well-cut and designed garments. The image of quality always tied back to their own cotton manufacturing. Horrockses Fashions advertisements regularly featured the sub-heading, “in fine cotton” under the brand name, underscoring excellence in their product. The eminence reserved for couture was also accorded to Horrockses dresses in some measure by its royal selection. Images of Queen Mary at the Horrockses showroom in Hanover Square and of Princesses Elizabeth (later Queen Elizabeth II) and Margaret wearing the dresses cemented the company’s image as respectable, feminine, and desirable. Editorial features in top fashion magazines also buoyed up Horrockses reputation as fashionable.

Though the name Horrockses might not be familiar to many today, their legacy is alive and well in contemporary fashion. In a Telegraph article by Katherine Rushton on April 20, 2013, the impending sale of the Horrockses company was discussed. The article states, “Horrockses vintage dresses had tapped into a growing demand for prom outfits, and that there was strong demand for newer versions…’These dresses are going on eBay for £250 each, they are part of Britain’s heritage.’” Hit television show Mad Men also likely whetted consumer appetites for mid-century style. It is not surprising then that in the past year, ready-to-wear line Maje featured lace dresses with “puff-ball” skirts in a bayadere style and Ines de la Fressange’s S/S 2017 line for Uniqlo featured full-skirted dresses in floral and gingham patterns, similar to what it has done in recent seasons. The Horrocks label was briefly resuscitated as a housewares line that sold at House of Fraser. Exhibitions of Horrockses Fashions have been mounted at the Harris Museum, Preston (2011) and the Fashion and Textile Museum, London (2010).

Maje’s Rayela dress from the A/W 2016-17 season featuring a full skirt and bayadere design, image from uk.maje.com

Further reading:

Boydell, Christine. Horrockses Fashions: Off-the-Peg Style in the 40s and 50s. London: V&A Publishing, 2010.

Burden, Rosemary and Jo Turney. Floral Frocks: The Floral Printed Dress From 1900 to Today. London: AAC Art Books, 2007.

Arnold, Rebecca, ‘Wifedressing: Designing Femininity in 1950s American Fashion,’ in Glenn Adamson and Victoria Kelley, eds., Surface Tensions: Surface, Finish and the Meaning of Objects, (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2013), pp.123-33.

Jackie O. and The Glamour of Privacy

January 27, 2017Posted by:

Mia

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With the new film Jackie, starring Natalie Portman in the title role, about to open in London there seems to be Jackie fever sweeping the media and culture in anticipation. Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy Onassis is admired all over the world for her style which expressed a very American elegance that seemed effortlessly simple, feminine, and glamourous. Her style, however, is almost always represented by the “Camelot” years in the White House and the few years before and after. As much as her style then was impeccable and lovely there was also another Jackie, whose way of dressing was softer, more romantic, creative, and practical, emitting a different kind of glamour – Jackie O. Her new moniker refers to her marriage to Greek shipping tycoon Aristotle Onassis from 1968 until his death in 1975 and marks a time when she took a deliberate turn away from the public eye and in so doing glamorized the tension between privacy and fame. It is widely considered that she married not for money but for things much more precious – privacy and, by extension, safety. After the assassination of her brother-in-law Robert F. Kennedy, Jackie’s fears for her children’s security grew and she determined to leave the country. That same year she married Onassis and embarked on a life in Europe, living in Greece, Capri, Paris and on Onassis’ yacht.

As First Lady in the early 1960s, Jackie had the styles of the time on her side. Given the more challenging fashion silhouettes of the 70s such as wide lapels, flared pant legs, busy prints, and clinging, shiny jersey, it is a decade that isn’t usually cited for classic, enduring looks. Yet, within this moment of fashion, Jackie O. forged a new look for herself through her taste and lifestyle that managed to be both timely and, once again, iconic. Big sunglasses, which she began wearing as early as 1966, were her staple, becoming so much a part of her image that they seem to be part of her face, and indeed she is perhaps even more recognizable with them on than off. It is rare to find a picture of her outdoors during this time with her eyes visible. In an effort to avoid being noticed, she paired her oversize sunglasses with large scarves, often from Hermes, worn kerchief style over her head. Add to this a trench coat with the collar turned up and her incognito uniform is completed.

Jackie O’s signature look of privacy. Arriving at JFK Airport, NYC April 3, 1976 ©Getty Images

These aspects of her dress are the most obvious ways in which she cultivated an aesthetics of privacy through her clothes, demeanor, and lifestyle. While both Vogue and Harper’s Bazaar cited her regularly in articles and editorials on style, inevitably the images they used were photographs of Jackie at public social events or on the streets. It is clear that Jackie O. was not willing to sit for editorial fashion spreads or cooperate with any publicity endeavors. She was photographed more than once going barefoot through the streets of Capri, sandals in hand, in order to outrun the paparazzi. A famous shot of her walking hurriedly down a New York city street as a photographer behind her snaps her picture captured the essence of Jackie O. – remote, dignified, casual, private.

Jackie sighted on Madison Avenue, October 7, 1971 ©Getty Images

She had two looks, one a sporty look of white jeans and a black top, either a crew neck t-shirt, button-down shirt, or black turtleneck sweater, often ribbed. The repetitive look was another uniform that created a public façade for protection.

Jackie outside Claridge’s in London, September 1970. Jackie O’s signature look of privacy ©Getty Images

Her look the rest of the time veered towards gypsy skirts, flip-flops or sandals, belts, peasant-style dresses, and increasingly, prints. She always carried a Gucci hobo bag later named for her. Instead of Givenchy and Dior dresses, Chanel suits, and Oleg Cassini gowns she was wearing lots of Valentino. Instead of dressing prim and proper for public consumption by representing the nation, Jackie was dressing for herself and she did so with a jet-set resort sensibility with a dash of au courant bohemianism. This new style was not only softer, more sensual, and more fluid, it screamed out exclusivity and rarefied living. It was neither the wardrobe of a First Lady nor one of a working woman of the day. These were off-duty, romantic, resort clothes that spoke of a leisured lifestyle based in a cosseted existence.

Jackie in Capri August 24, 1970 in a gypsy skirt and sunglasses ©Getty Images

Ironically, just as the oversize sunglasses obscuring her face ultimately came to identify her, Jackie’s extreme avoidance of photographers and publicity of any kind during these years had the effect of making her even more alluring to the public. Photographs of her became the paparazzi’s holy grail. Remoteness makes the desired object all the more alluring and the image of Jackie O. in the 1970s epitomized this paradoxical aspect of glamour.

After the death of Onassis, Jackie took up a career as a book editor and turned to a typical Upper East side of New York look of lady-like suits and slacks with trim sweaters. She returned to a social life in the city though she remained low-key about publicity. Her days of being a recluse were over but their impact on the image of glamour endures.

Wearing a printed dress to attend the Metropolitan Opera House Royal Ballet in NYC, May 7, 1974 ©Getty Images

A Visit to the V&A

December 16, 2016Posted by:

Mia

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For viewing fashion from 1920-1960, there is no better place in London than the Fashion Galleries, Room 40, at the Victoria and Albert Museum. So, off I went to South Kensington to see the displays which cover the highlights of fashion from 1750 to the present. The display cases are lined along the perimeter of a large circular gallery which allows one to choose whether to follow a chronological path or to travel against time as one wishes. These are some of the highlights of the exhibition.

The 1920s and 1930s are emphasised as a time of increased bodily ease and comfort in fashion as designs became more fluid and less ornate than before World War I. No longer defined by the waist, fashions of the 20s were tubular in shape and hemlines were raised to below the knee, allowing for a wider range of motion benefitting popular dances such as the Charleston. In the 1930s, attire for sporting activities became important and influenced fashion which is represented in a display of a tennis dress, two bathing costumes, and a beach walking suit. The active body and increased independence for women were key aspects of modernity reflected in the fashions of the time. Fashionable sportswear presents such activities as tennis, bathing, and dancing as appropriate and even desirable for women.

Wartime austerity in Britain is represented by a Utility Suit from 1943 with a gas-mask bag worn cross-body as many handbags are today. Restrictions on clothing circumscribed that skirts should be knee-length without pleats and folds that would require an excess of fabric and jackets could not have more than three buttons.

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The close tailoring of the 1940s, imposed upon women, lasted until 1947 when Christian Dior famously showed his collection featuring longer, voluminous skirts and nipped-in defined waists dubbed the ‘New Look.’ To help women embrace what was a sea-change in dressing, magazines such as Vogue promoted the new silhouette heavily, which eventually became an icon of the 1950s. A display devoted to Dior’s ‘Zemire’ dress from 1954, made for Lady Sekers, showcases the elements of the ensemble. The undergarments reveal how the silhouette of a sculpted bodice and full, circular skirt are achieved. The close narrow shoulders and wasp-waist jacket contrast with the skirt’s volume to create the extreme hour-glass figure reminiscent of the mid-nineteenth century, a source underscored by the mirror and fan in the display. The Dior case is a clear highlight of the gallery, at once deconstructing and celebrating the designer’s signature look.

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Maison Doucet

December 2, 2016Posted by:

Mia

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During the Belle Epoque period, at 21 Rue de la Paix in Paris, stood Maison Doucet, one of the most fashionable couture houses of the day. Under the tutelage of Jacques Doucet, Paul Poiret got his start there, as did Madeleine Vionnet, before they went on to their own success as couturiers. The clients at Doucet, as with most top couture houses, ranged from social elites and nobles to courtesans and celebrity actresses such as Rejane and Sarah Bernhardt (Figs. 1 and 2). Notably, Doucet was also patronized by younger American socialites such as Carrie Schermerhorn Astor, Consuelo Vanderbilt, and Edith Wharton.

thumbnail_doucet-rejane-cover-3 — Fig. 1: Actress Rejane wearing a Doucet at-home gown, cover of Les Modes, August 1902.

thumbnail_doucet-bruck-les-modes — Fig. 2: P. Nadar. Actress Rosa Bruck in Doucet, Les Modes, November, 1901.

To dispel the expenses of a trip to Paris, Doucet dresses were sold in New York at Arnold, Constable & Co. and Lord & Taylor’s and models were available at the exclusive dressmaking establishments of Madame Barnes and Madame Donovan. More than one woman who did return from Paris with a Doucet in her trunk reportedly tried to evade customs because of the excessive duties.

Turn-of-the-century fashions were characterized by exuberant surface decoration, where the materials, techniques, and styling of different decorative elements showed off one’s prosperity, indeed Doucet indulged heavily in such excess of beautification. One of the characteristic traits of the Doucet aesthetic is the use of fluid, unstructured fabrics such as lace, tulle, silk, fur, and satin (Figs. 3 and 4). From the turn of the century, with the body-skimming Directoire style and the taste for tea gowns, Maison Doucet’s expertise with fabrics put the couture house at the height of fashion. Doucet dresses were just a bit softer in their drape, delicate in their surfaces and the vision of beauty fit in with the more sensitive side of the time. That Doucet’s clients were daughters of great society matrons, wives of executives in the fashion retail industry, and popular actresses, confirms that the ultra-femininity of the Maison’s designs were fashion-forward and distinct from the stiffer prestige image of the House of Worth. Is it any wonder then that both Edith Wharton and Marcel Proust conjured up characters that answered to the siren call of Doucet frocks?

Fig. 3: Doucet. Reception or ball gown. 1910. Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.

Fig. 4: Doucet. Afternoon or tea gown. 1900-1903. Metropolitan Museum of Art.

High society dressing was very much a public consideration, a performance of wealth, class belonging and taste in the age of crass overnight millionaires and dollar princesses. In the highly codified world of social elites, elaborate surface decoration gave expression to the complexity and power of social wealth, presenting ornate femininity as an index of masculine financial prowess in the new business order.

The Maison Doucet sensibilities dovetail with the eighteenth-century revival fashion trend to which he contributed and executed at the highest level, informed by his own art collecting and connoisseurship. The sinuous lines of a peach embroidered ball gown in the art nouveau style have their clear precedent and inspiration in the eighteenth-century meandering lines of Rococo design, found particularly in textiles (Fig. 5).

Fig. 5: Doucet. Ball gown, 1898-1900. Metropolitan Museum of Art. Art Nouveau tiger lily design reminiscent of the Rococo period. Worn by Caroline Schermerhorn Astor Wilson.

Of all the dress styles in a lady’s wardrobe, it was the tea gown, or at-home gown, that most embodied and fulfilled the sensual femininity of the Doucet aesthetic. Due to its light and clingy materials that skimmed a woman’s uncorseted body, it had a naturally suggestive quality to it. The abundance of airy lace over fluid, unstructured silk of a 1907 tea gown conveys the romantic and delicate aesthetic of the early century under the lofty eye of Doucet (Fig. 6). The tea gown’s softness underscores the traditional relationship between femininity and the private sphere while also promoting modern modes of dressing for comfort. The secret to the successful Doucet aesthetic seems to lie in the unabashed sensuality of the clothes no matter what the occasion.

Fig. 6: Doucet. Tea gown, 1907. Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Anna Maria Garthwaite, Spitalfields Silk, and English Rococo

November 3, 2016Posted by:

Mia

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The Spitalfields area of London was a major force in shaping eighteenth-century fashion as it was the center of the silk-weaving industry in England. Silk manufacture drove the very business of fashion for the increasing pace of change in trends during the century was found primarily in new textile patterns rather than garment styles or silhouettes which held sway for lengthier periods of time.[1] The type of motifs, scale, rendering, and color palette in textile patterns went in and out of fashion and can be used to identify a garment as being from the 1710s, 1740s, or 1760s. The importance of silk-weaving and new designs to Georgian fashion cannot be underestimated as they conveyed not only taste but also status and wealth for the wearer.

Remarkably, one of the most successful and influential designers of silk patterns was an English woman, Anna Maria Garthwaite (1690-1763), who came to Spitalfields in 1730 and quickly infiltrated the male-dominated and family-based industry. In fact, the establishment and prosperity of Spitalfields silk-weaving was due largely to waves of immigration by French Huguenots fleeing persecution in the 16^th and 17^th centuries, many of whom were weavers bringing advanced skills.[2] As a forty year old single woman, it is unlikely that Garthwaite received much if any of the formal training required of her male counterparts.[3] She worked in watercolor and at her most prolific produced approximately eighty designs a year, tapering off in the 1750s to about thirty designs per annum

Garthwaite’s talent in floral patterns lent itself to the emergent Rococo style in the design arts. Concurrently, the development the points rentres technique allowed for rendering more three-dimensional, detailed shading on the drawloom in imitation of painting.[4] The result was that larger, bolder designs showing off greater detail came to characterize flowered silks of the 1730s. As English designers such as Garthwaite took up the aesthetics of painting in woven silk design, naturalism came to be the “English” style, defining their version of the Rococo in contrast to the greater French inclination towards stylization, busier patterns, and colored grounds often incorporating ribbons, lace, shells, fur, and rocaille (stylized rock formations) alongside floral motifs.

Garthwaite’s composition above ingeniously creates opportunities to show off three-dimensional shading with leaves that curve outwards, petals and small posies that overlap each other, and peaches that seem to revel in their own roundness. Because Garthwaite’s style doesn’t seem to bear influence from the leading naturalists of the day, scholar Natalie Rothstein believes that Garthwaite would have visited botanical gardens directly to familiarize herself with the details of a wide variety of plants, especially those not native to the area.[5] Garthwaite’s style then appears to be down to her own artistic vision and natural talent, and if her designs show the current trends in English silks, it is because she drove those trends.

The most distinctive feature of the Rococo was the S-curve line known as the Line of Beauty, promoted by William Hogarth in his treatise, Analysis of Beauty (1753) as well as the influential manual Laboratory or School of the Arts (1756). This meandering line can be found as early as 1743 in Garthwaite’s designs.[6] Though a connected line is not always present, the curving motifs draw the eye on a sinuous path, seemingly turning and greeting each other in mimicry of partnered dances such as the minuet.

Most garments made from Spitalfields silks were altered, usually in the late 1780s or in the 1830s when dress styles changed and such flowered silks could fit the fashions. Surviving silks designed by Garthwaite can be viewed at the V&A in the British Galleries, Room 52B. In addition, a panel thought to be a Garthwaite design hangs in the Dennis Severs House in Spitalfields in the Hogarth room (to the left of the window). Her home at the corner of Princelet and Wilkes Streets still stands today and is marked by a plaque.

It is remarkable that a woman like Anna Maria Garthwaite achieved the level of success that she did. It is a testament not only to her sheer talent and vision but also her courage to value her own abilities.

[1] Natalie Rothstein, The Victoria & Albert Museum’s Textile Collection: Woven Textile Design in Britain to 1750. (New York: Canopy Books, 1994), 7.

[2] Natalie Rothstein, The Victoria & Albert Museum’s Textile Collection: Woven Textile Design in Britain to 1750. (New York: Canopy Books, 1994), 17

[3] A. K. Sabin, Spitalfields Silks. (London: Bethnal Green Museum, 1931), 8-9.

[4] Catalog entry, silk skirt panel by Anna Maria Garthwaite, 1749, Victoria and Albert Museum.

[5] Natalie Rothstein, The Victoria & Albert Museum’s Textile Collection: Woven Textile Design in Britain to 1750. (New York: Canopy Books, 1994), 15.

[6] Rothstein, The Victoria & Albert Museum’s Textile Collection: Woven Textile Design in Britain to 1750. (New York: Canopy Books, 1994), 8.

Further Reading

Brown, Clare, ed. Silk Designs of the Eighteenth Century from the Victoria & Albert

Museum. New York: Thames and Hudson, 1990.

Buss, Chiara. The Meandering Pattern in Brocaded Silks 1745-1775. Milan:

Ermenegildo Zegna Holditalia Spa, 1990.

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