Pantalettes
Encyclopedia
Undergarment
Undergarments or underwear are clothes worn under other clothes, often next to the skin. They keep outer garments from being soiled by bodily secretions and discharges, shape the body, and provide support for parts of it. In cold weather, long underwear is sometimes worn to provide additional...
s covering the legs worn by women, girls, and very young boys (before they were breeched) in the early- to mid-nineteenth century.
A form of leggings
Leggings
Leggings are a type of fitted clothing covering the legs, which can be worn by both men and women.Originally leggings were two separate garments, one for each leg....
or long drawers
Undergarment
Undergarments or underwear are clothes worn under other clothes, often next to the skin. They keep outer garments from being soiled by bodily secretions and discharges, shape the body, and provide support for parts of it. In cold weather, long underwear is sometimes worn to provide additional...
, pantalettes originated in France in the early 19th century, and quickly spread to Britain
United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland was the formal name of the United Kingdom during the period when what is now the Republic of Ireland formed a part of it....
and America
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
. Pantalettes could be one-piece or two separate garments, one for each leg, attached at the waist with buttons or laces. They were most often of white linen
Linen
Linen is a textile made from the fibers of the flax plant, Linum usitatissimum. Linen is labor-intensive to manufacture, but when it is made into garments, it is valued for its exceptional coolness and freshness in hot weather....
fabric and could be decorated with tucks, lace
Lace
Lace is an openwork fabric, patterned with open holes in the work, made by machine or by hand. The holes can be formed via removal of threads or cloth from a previously woven fabric, but more often open spaces are created as part of the lace fabric. Lace-making is an ancient craft. True lace was...
, cutwork
Cutwork
Cutwork or cut work is a needlework technique in which portions of a textile are cut away and the resulting "hole" is reinforced and filled with embroidery or needle lace.Cutwork is a related to drawn thread work...
or broderie anglaise
Broderie Anglaise
Broderie Anglaise is a whitework needlework technique incorporating features of embroidery, cutwork and needle lace that arose in England in the 19th century....
.
Ankle-length pantalettes for women were worn under the crinoline
Crinoline
Crinoline was originally a stiff fabric with a weft of horse-hair and a warp of cotton or linen thread. The fabric first appeared around 1830, but by 1850 the word had come to mean a stiffened petticoat or rigid skirt-shaped structure of steel designed to support the skirts of a woman’s dress into...
and hoop skirt to ensure that the legs were modestly covered. Pantalettes for children and young girls were mid-calf to ankle-length and were intended to show under their shorter skirts.
