1890s in fashion
Encyclopedia
Sportswear (fashion)
Sportswear has been called America's main contribution to the history of fashion design. The term became popular in the 1920s to describe relaxed, casual wear typically worn for spectator sports...
.
Women's fashions
Fashionable women's clothing styles shed some of the extravagances of previous decades (so that skirts were neither crinolined as in the 1850s1850s in fashion
1850s fashion in Western and Western-influenced clothing is characterized by an increase in the width of women's skirts supported by crinolines or hoops, and the beginnings of dress reform.-Gowns:...
, nor protrudingly bustled in back as in the late 1860s
1860s in fashion
1860s fashion in European and European-influenced clothing is characterized by extremely full-skirted women's fashions relying on crinolines and hoops and the emergence of "alternative fashions" under the influence of the Artistic Dress movement....
and mid-1880s
1880s in fashion
Fashion in the 1880s in European and European-influenced countries is characterized by the return of the bustle. The long, lean line of the 1870s was replaced by a full, curvy silhouette with gradually widening shoulders. Fashionable waists were low and tiny below a full, low bust supported by a...
, nor tight as in the late 1870s
1870s in fashion
1870s fashion in European and European-influenced clothing is characterized by a gradual return to a narrow silhouette after the full-skirted fashions of the 1850s and 1860s.-Overview:...
), but corset
Corset
A corset is a garment worn to hold and shape the torso into a desired shape for aesthetic or medical purposes...
ing continued unmitigated, or even slightly increased in severity. Early 1890s
1890s
The 1890s were sometimes referred to as the "Mauve Decade" - because William Henry Perkin's aniline dye allowed the widespread use of that colour in fashion - and also as the "Gay Nineties", under the then-current usage of the word "gay" which referred simply to merriment and frivolity, with no...
dresses consisted of a tight bodice
Bodice
A bodice, historically, is an article of clothing for women, covering the body from the neck to the waist. In modern usage it typically refers to a specific type of upper garment common in Europe during the 16th to the 18th century, or to the upper portion of a modern dress to distinguish it from...
with the skirt
Skirt
A skirt is a tube- or cone-shaped garment that hangs from the waist and covers all or part of the legs.In the western world, skirts are usually considered women's clothing. However, there are exceptions...
gathered at the waist and falling more naturally over the hips and undergarments than in previous years.
The mid 1890s introduced leg o'mutton sleeve
Sleeve
Sleeve is that part of a garment which covers the arm, or through which the arm passes or slips. The pattern of the sleeve is one of the characteristics of fashion in dress, varying in every country and period...
s, which grew in size each year until they disappeared in about 1906. During the same period of the mid '90s, skirts took on an A-line silhouette that was almost bell-like. The late 1890s returned to the tighter sleeves often with small puffs or ruffles capping the shoulder but fitted to the wrist. Skirts took on a trumpet shape, fitting more closely over the hip and flaring just above the knee. Corsets in the 1890s helped define the hourglass figure as immortalized by artist Charles Dana Gibson
Charles Dana Gibson
Charles Dana Gibson was an American graphic artist, best known for his creation of the Gibson Girl, an iconic representation of the beautiful and independent American woman at the turn of the 20th century....
. In the very late 1890s the corset elongated, giving the women a slight S-curve silhouette that would be popular well into the Edwardian era.
Sportswear and tailored fashions
Changing attitudes about acceptable activities for women also made sportswear popular for women, with such notable examples as the bicycling dress and the tennis dress.Unfussy, tailor
Tailor
A tailor is a person who makes, repairs, or alters clothing professionally, especially suits and men's clothing.Although the term dates to the thirteenth century, tailor took on its modern sense in the late eighteenth century, and now refers to makers of men's and women's suits, coats, trousers,...
ed clothes were worn for outdoor activities and traveling. The shirtwaist, a costume with a bodice
Bodice
A bodice, historically, is an article of clothing for women, covering the body from the neck to the waist. In modern usage it typically refers to a specific type of upper garment common in Europe during the 16th to the 18th century, or to the upper portion of a modern dress to distinguish it from...
or waist tailored like a man's shirt with a high collar, was adopted for informal daywear and became the uniform of working women. Walking suits featured ankle-length skirts with matching jackets. The notion of "rational dress" for women's health was a widely discussed topic in 1891, which led to the development of sports dress. This included ample skirts with a belted blouse for hockey. In addition, cycling
Cycling
Cycling, also called bicycling or biking, is the use of bicycles for transport, recreation, or for sport. Persons engaged in cycling are cyclists or bicyclists...
became very popular and led to the development of "cycling costumes", which were shorter skirts or "bloomers
Bloomers
Bloomers may refer to:* Bloomers , the undergarment named after Amelia Bloomer.* Bloomers , the 1979 BBC sitcom by James Saunders, starring Richard Beckinsale....
" which were Turkish trouser
Turkish trousers
Turkish trousers are baggy trousers gathered in tightly at the ankle. They are part of the folk costume of Turkey and they are called şalvar in Turkish....
style outfits. By the 1890s, women bicyclists increasingly wore bloomers in public and in the company of men as well as other women. Bloomers seem to have been more commonly worn in Paris than in England or the United States and became quite popular and fashionable. Swimwear was also developed, usually made of navy blue with a long tunic over full knickers.
Day dresses typical of the time period had high necks, wasp waists, puffed sleeves and bell-shaped skirts. Evening gowns had a squared decolletage, a wasp-waist cut and skirts with long trains.
Influence of aesthetic dress
The 1890s1890s
The 1890s were sometimes referred to as the "Mauve Decade" - because William Henry Perkin's aniline dye allowed the widespread use of that colour in fashion - and also as the "Gay Nineties", under the then-current usage of the word "gay" which referred simply to merriment and frivolity, with no...
in both Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...
and North America saw growing acceptance of artistic or aesthetic dress
Artistic Dress movement
The Artistic Dress movement and its successor, Aesthetic Dress, were fashion trends in nineteenth century clothing that rejected the highly structured and heavily trimmed Paris fashion of the day in favour of beautiful materials and simplicity of design....
as mainstream fashion, especially in the adoption of the uncorseted tea gown
Tea gown
A tea gown or tea-gown is a woman's at-home dress for informal entertaining of the late 19th to mid-20th centuries characterized by unstructured lines and light fabrics. Early tea gowns were a European development influenced by Asian clothing, part of the japonism of Aesthetic dress...
for at-home wear. In US in this period, Dress, the Jenness Miller Magazine (1887–1898) http://costume.osu.edu/Reforming_Fashion/artistic_dress.htm, reported that tea gowns were being worn outside the home for the first time in fashionable summer resorts.
Hairstyles and Headgear
Hairstyles at the start of the decade were simply a carry-over from the 1880s styles that included curled or frizzled bangs over the forehead as well as hair swept to the top of the head, but after 1892, hairstyles became increasingly influenced by the Gibson GirlGibson Girl
The Gibson Girl was the personification of a feminine ideal as portrayed in the satirical pen-and-ink-illustrated stories created by illustrator Charles Dana Gibson during a 20-year period spanning the late nineteenth and early twentieth century in the United States.Some people argue that the...
. By the mid-1890s, hair had become looser and wavier and bangs gradually faded from high fashion. By the end of the decade, hair was often worn in a large mass with a bun at the top of the head, a style that would be predominant during the first decade of the 20th century.
Style gallery 1890–96
- Praskovia Tchaokovskaia wears a high-necked afternoon dress with puffed elbow-length sleeves and a fabric belt or sash, Russia, 1890–92.
- Day dresses of 1892 have low waists and high necklines. Sleeves have a high, gathered sleeve-head and are fitted to the lower arm. Skirts are fuller in back than front.
- Evening gowns of 1892–3 feature short or elbow-length full, puffed sleeves and floral trimmings.
- City or traveling suit has full upper sleeves and back fullness in the skirt.
- Walking suits of 1894 show shorter skirts and matching jackets with leg o' mutton sleeves.
- Punch Cartoon of 1895 shows a fashionable bicycle suit.
- Natalie Barney in 1896
- Charvet advertising in 1896
Style gallery 1897–99
- Madame Faydou wears her hair in a knot on top of her head. Her black dress and her daughter's grey dress (probably mourning attire) have fashionable leg o' mutton sleeves, 1897.
- Catherine Vlasto wears a white dress with puffed elbow-length sleeves and ribbon bows. Her hair is parted in the center and poufed casually at her temples, 1897.
- 1897 fashion plate shows an idealized form of the fashionable figure. The jacket has an asymmetrical closure and new, smaller sleeve puffs.
- Bathing costumes of 1898 have nautical details such as sailor collars.
- Dress of 1898 shows a short, wide puff at the shoulder over a long, tight sleeve.
- Charvet corsage of 1898 shows a corsage by Charvet. It is a blouse of pink cambric finely plaited, and with a white cascade frill, also of cambric, down the center.
- Shirt-waist from Charvet in 1898 shows a shirt-waist from Charvet. It has a group of tucks down either side of the front and back from the shoulders, and in addition has two deep horizontal tucks across the front. A broad box-pleat at the centre is edged with a tiny black frill, which is also carried around the basque. The sleeves are tucked in diagonal groups.
- 1899 fashion plate shows the narrow, gored skirt and more natural shoulder of the turn of the century (as well as the results of "S-bend" corseting).
- Tea Gown of 1899 shows "Watteau back" and frothy trim.
- Two women in Watteau-backed tea gowns with high sashed waists, 1899.
Caricatures
- 1890s cigar box satirizes the liberating effects of wearing bloomers.
Men's fashion
Coats, jackets, and trousers
By the 1890s, the sack coat (UK lounge coat) was fast replacing the frock coatFrock coat
A frock coat is a man's coat characterised by knee-length skirts all around the base, popular during the Victorian and Edwardian periods. The double-breasted style is sometimes called a Prince Albert . The frock coat is a fitted, long-sleeved coat with a centre vent at the back, and some features...
for most informal and semi-formal occasions. Three-piece suits ("ditto suit
Ditto suit
The ditto suit is an early precursor of the lounge suit but often had a coat more akin to a frock coat or morning coat. That the waistcoat and trousers were matching made the suit more informal than those with silk faced lapels worn with formal striped trousers.-External links:* on display at the...
s") consisting of a sack coat with matching waistcoat
Waistcoat
A waistcoat or vest is a sleeveless upper-body garment worn over a dress shirt and necktie and below a coat as a part of most men's formal wear, and as the third piece of the three-piece male business suit.-Characteristics and use:...
(U.S. vest) and trousers
Trousers
Trousers are an item of clothing worn on the lower part of the body from the waist to the ankles, covering both legs separately...
were worn, as were matching coat and waistcoat with contrasting trousers.
Contrasting waistcoats were popular, and could be made with or without collars and lapels. The usual style was single-breasted.
The blazer
Blazer
A blazer is a type of jacket. The term blazer occasionally is synonymous with boating jacket and sports jacket, two different garments. A blazer resembles a suit coat cut more casually — sometimes with flap-less patch pockets and metal buttons. A blazer's cloth is usually durable , because it is an...
, a navy blue or brightly-colored or striped flannel
Flannel
Flannel is a soft woven fabric, of various fineness. Flannel was originally made from carded wool or worsted yarn, but is now often made from either wool, cotton, or synthetic fibre. Flannel may be brushed to create extra softness or remain unbrushed. The brushing process is a mechanical process...
coat cut like a sack coat with patch pockets and brass buttons, was worn for sports, sailing, and other casual activities.
The Norfolk jacket
Norfolk jacket
A Norfolk jacket is a loose, belted, single-breasted jacket with box pleats on the back and front, with a belt or half-belt. The style was long popular for boys' jackets and suits, and is still used in some uniforms. It was originally designed as a shooting coat that did not bind when the elbow...
remained fashionable for shooting and rugged outdoor pursuits. It was made of sturdy tweed or similar fabric and featured paired box pleats over the chest and back, with a fabric belt. Worn with matching breeches
Breeches
Breeches are an item of clothing covering the body from the waist down, with separate coverings for each leg, usually stopping just below the knee, though in some cases reaching to the ankles...
(or U.S. knickerbockers
Knickerbockers (clothing)
Knickerbockers are men's or boys' breeches or baggy-kneed trousers particularly popular in the early twentieth century USA. Golfers' plus twos and plus fours were breeches of this type...
, it became the Norfolk suit, suitable for bicycling or golf with knee-length stockings and low shoes, or for hunting with sturdy boots or shoes with leather gaiters
Gaiters
Gaiters are garments worn over the shoe and lower pant leg, and used primarily as personal protective equipment; similar garments used primarily for display are spats....
.
The cutaway morning coat was still worn for formal day occasions in Europe and major cities elsewhere.
The most formal evening dress
Evening dress
Evening dress may refer to:* White tie, the most formal civilian dress code in Western fashion* Black tie, a semi-formal dress code for evening events and social functions in Western fashion...
remained a dark tail coat and trousers with a dark or light waistcoat. Evening wear was worn with a white bow tie and a shirt with a winged collar.
The less formal dinner jacket or tuxedo, which featured a shawl collar with silk or satin facings, now generally had a single button. Dinner jackets were appropriate formal wear when "dressing for dinner" at home or at a men's club. The dinner jacket was worn with a white shirt and a dark tie.
Knee-length topcoat
Topcoat
Topcoat may refer to:*A lightweight overcoat*The guard hairs of an animal's fur*A transparent or translucent coat of paint applied over the underlying material as a sealer...
s, often with contrasting velvet or fur collars, and calf-length overcoat
Overcoat
An overcoat is a type of long coat intended to be worn as the outermost garment. Overcoats usually extend below the knee, but are sometimes mistakenly referred to as topcoats, which are short coats that end at or above the knees. Topcoats and overcoats together are known as outercoats...
s were worn in winter.
Shirts and neckties
Shirt collarsCollar (clothing)
In clothing, a collar is the part of a shirt, dress, coat or blouse that fastens around or frames the neck. Among clothing construction professionals, a collar is differentiated from other necklines such as revers and lapels, by being made from a separate piece of fabric, rather than a folded or...
were turned over or pressed into "wings", and became taller through the decade. Dress shirts had stiff fronts, sometimes decorated with shirt stud
Shirt stud
A shirt stud is a decorative fastener that fits onto a buttonhole on the front of a pleated shirt, or onto the starched bib of a stiff-front shirt. Such shirts have special buttonholes solely for shirt studs....
s and buttoned up the back. Striped shirts were popular for informal occasions.
The usual necktie
Necktie
A necktie is a long piece of cloth worn for decorative purposes around the neck or shoulders, resting under the shirt collar and knotted at the throat. Variants include the ascot tie, bow tie, bolo tie, and the clip-on tie. The modern necktie, ascot, and bow tie are descended from the cravat. Neck...
was a four-in-hand or an Ascot tie
Ascot tie
An ascot tie, or ascot, is a narrow neckband with wide pointed wings, traditionally made of pale grey patterned silk. This wide, formal tie is usually patterned, folded over, and fastened with a stickpin or tie tack. It is usually reserved for wear with morning dress for formal daytime weddings and...
, made up as a neckband with wide wings attached and worn with a stickpin, but the 1890s also saw the return of the bow tie
Bow tie
The bow tie is a type of men's necktie. It consists of a ribbon of fabric tied around the collar in a symmetrical manner such that the two opposite ends form loops. Ready-tied bow ties are available, in which the distinctive bow is sewn into shape and the band around the neck incorporates a clip....
(in various proportions) for day dress.
Accessories
As earlier in the century, top hatTop hat
A top hat, beaver hat, high hat silk hat, cylinder hat, chimney pot hat or stove pipe hat is a tall, flat-crowned, broad-brimmed hat, predominantly worn from the latter part of the 18th to the middle of the 20th century...
s remained a requirement for upper class formal wear; bowlers
Bowler hat
The bowler hat, also known as a coke hat, derby , billycock or bombin, is a hard felt hat with a rounded crown originally created in 1849 for the English soldier and politician Edward Coke, the younger brother of the 2nd Earl of Leicester...
and soft felt hats in a variety of shapes were worn for more casual occasions, and flat straw boaters
Boater (hat)
A boater is a kind of men's formal summer hat....
were worn for yachting and at the seashore.
Style gallery
- Painter John Singer Sargent in formal evening dress, c. 1890.
- Another portrait of Sargent, in day dress: dark coat and waiscoat, dark red ascot, and tall collar, c. 1890. This picture shows the long, lean silhouette in fashion at this time.
- Oscar Wilde wears a frock coatFrock coatA frock coat is a man's coat characterised by knee-length skirts all around the base, popular during the Victorian and Edwardian periods. The double-breasted style is sometimes called a Prince Albert . The frock coat is a fitted, long-sleeved coat with a centre vent at the back, and some features...
with a pocket square, 1890s. - Frederick Law Olmsted wears a tan topcoatTopcoatTopcoat may refer to:*A lightweight overcoat*The guard hairs of an animal's fur*A transparent or translucent coat of paint applied over the underlying material as a sealer...
over a gray suit, 1895. - George du Maurier wears a double-breasted waistcoat with a shawl collar under his sack coat, with grey trousers. He wears square-toed shoes with spats, 1896.
- Country clothes: James TissotJames TissotJames Jacques Joseph Tissot was a French painter, who spent much of his career in Britain.-Biography:Tissot was born in Nantes, France. In about 1856, he began study at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris under Hippolyte Flandrin and Lamothe, and became friendly with Edgar Degas and James Abbott...
wears breeches and high boots with a reddish collared waistcoat and a brown coat. Even with this casual outdoor costume, he wears a tie, 1898. - College fashion includes a straw boater. William BeveridgeWilliam BeveridgeWilliam Henry Beveridge, 1st Baron Beveridge KCB was a British economist and social reformer. He is best known for his 1942 report Social Insurance and Allied Services which served as the basis for the post-World War II welfare state put in place by the Labour government elected in 1945.Lord...
at Balliol, 1898.
