Description
The dressmaking trade developed rapidly during the 18th and 19th centuries, changing the lives of thousands of British workers. Busks, Basques and Brush-Braidfocuses on the trade and the people within it, from their working conditions and earnings to their training, services and relationships with customers.
Exploring the lives of dressmakers in fact and fiction, the book looks at representations of the trade in the plays and novels of the time, while surveying the often harsh realities of the workers' lives. From the arrival of the sewing machine to the influence of the department store, it explores the impact of mechanization, commercialization and modernity on a historical trade. Pamela Inder illuminates a new world of dressmaking enabled by goods like paper patterns and magazines, and sets out to investigate the increasing monopoly of female dressmakers in an industry once dominated by male tailors.
Drawing on a range of original and hitherto unpublished sources - including business records, diaries, letters, bills and newspaper articles - Busks, Basques and Brush-Braid reveals the untold story of the dressmaking trade. Beautifully illustrated with over 80 images, the book brings dressmakers into focus as real people, granting new insights into working class life in 18th- and 19th-century Britain.
Author: Pam Inder
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing PLC
Published: 01/27/2022
Pages: 340
Binding Type: Paperback
Weight: 1.04lbs
Size: 9.21h x 6.14w x 0.70d
ISBN13: 9781350242838
ISBN10: 1350242837
BISAC Categories:
- Design | Fashion & Accessories
- Social Science | Sociology | General
- History | Europe | Great Britain | Victorian Era (1837-1901)
Exploring the lives of dressmakers in fact and fiction, the book looks at representations of the trade in the plays and novels of the time, while surveying the often harsh realities of the workers' lives. From the arrival of the sewing machine to the influence of the department store, it explores the impact of mechanization, commercialization and modernity on a historical trade. Pamela Inder illuminates a new world of dressmaking enabled by goods like paper patterns and magazines, and sets out to investigate the increasing monopoly of female dressmakers in an industry once dominated by male tailors.
Drawing on a range of original and hitherto unpublished sources - including business records, diaries, letters, bills and newspaper articles - Busks, Basques and Brush-Braid reveals the untold story of the dressmaking trade. Beautifully illustrated with over 80 images, the book brings dressmakers into focus as real people, granting new insights into working class life in 18th- and 19th-century Britain.
Author: Pam Inder
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing PLC
Published: 01/27/2022
Pages: 340
Binding Type: Paperback
Weight: 1.04lbs
Size: 9.21h x 6.14w x 0.70d
ISBN13: 9781350242838
ISBN10: 1350242837
BISAC Categories:
- Design | Fashion & Accessories
- Social Science | Sociology | General
- History | Europe | Great Britain | Victorian Era (1837-1901)
About the Author
Pam Inder is an independent scholar and was formerly Curator of Applied Arts at first Exeter and then Leicestershire Museums (specialising in dress history), after being an Assistant Curator at Birmingham City Art Gallery. She later taught at Staffordshire and De Montfort Universities.