1848 Striped silk taffeta dress

1848 Striped silk taffeta dress
Date	1846-1852
Category	Women
Item	Dress
Fabric	Silk taffeta
Decoration	Ribbons, Lace
Wearer	-
Maker	-
Acc. no.	HC.D-0.18

1846-1852 A dress in striped silk taffeta.

A view of the dress from the side-back
Detail of the gathers at the front waist
The end of one of the sleeves
Detail of the pleated ribbon on the sleeve ends
Detail of the fabric

Description

The taffeta has stripes of pale grey alternating with sections of very narrow stripes of black and ivory, both 1⅞" wide; between these are stripes of pink satin, ½" wide, with three very narrow ivory taffeta stripes on them. The pink has faded in places.

The bodice is lined with natural linen and the sleeves and skirt with cream glazed cotton. There are 16 hooks down the centre back bodice opening with 15 worked bars and an eye at the waist; the centre front is also open down 6¾" from the neck, with five hooks and worked bars.

The bodice front has five pleats into each shoulder seam, about 1" apart. 9½" down from the neck the fullness is tightly gathered into a section 7" deep, 5¾" wide, narrowing to 4½" at the waist; it has 10 rows of stitching, about ¹¹⁄₁₆" apart.

The sleeves widen towards the ends, with two pleats, ¼" deep, at the elbow each side of the seam. The ends have two rows of pale grey silk satin ribbon box-pleated round them. On alternate pleats the centre of the top and bottom edges are stitched together raising them up, and the centre is stitched to its neighbour; this trimming has become distorted over time. The lower ribbon is 1¼" above the sleeve end and the second is 1" above that; 1¼" wide cream silk lace edging lies round the end and between the ribbons. The inside has a facing of the striped silk extending up nearly to the elbow.

The sleeve ends, armhole seams and neck edge are piped, as is the waist seam which dips down in a curve at the front.

The skirt is cartridge pleated into the waist all round and the centre back opening is 10½" deep; there is a pocket in the right side-front seam, 6" down from the waist, whose opening is faced with the striped silk.