Dressed: Fashionable Dress in Aotearoa NZ 1840 To 1910

ISBN: 9780994146069
Title: Dressed: Fashionable Dress in Aotearoa NZ 1840 To 1910
Author: REGNAULT CLAIRE

When crinolines, bustles and ostrich feathers were the height of colonial fashion. This richly illustrated and lively social history explores the creation, consumption and spectacle of fashionable dress in Aotearoa New Zealand from 1840 to the early 1900s. Dressmakers were essential contributors to the development of New Zealand, and as a colonial outpost of the British Empire, New Zealands 19th century dress culture was heavily shaped by international trends. Interactions with Māori, the demands of settler lifestyle and the countrys geography all added another layer. Dressed teems with the fascinating, busy lives of early businesswomen, society women and civic figures. Featuring dresses and fashionable accessories from museums throughout Aotearoa New Zealand, and including over 270 images, this major book makes a significant contribution to histories of colonial dress.

\"This superb tome of the history of women's fashion in 19th century New Zealand offers detailed descriptions of how women dressed, for everyday life and for special events, what their gowns were made of, who sewed them, who wore them to what occasions, and what happened to them after the wedding, the ball, the party, the horse-riding, the tennis match or the mountain climbing was over.

Claire Regnault is head curator of textiles at Te Papa, and this book has grown from her lifetime professional interest and fascination with her subject. The extraordinary degree of detail is based on Te Papa collections, which are then interpreted into context so that the book becomes a social history of women's lives in a century of the settler colony. The chapters are titled - Stitch! Stitch! Stitch!; Hard Shopping; Rites of Passage; Balls, Plain and Fancy; Feathermania; Dressing for Royalty; The Active Woman - with most of them carrying upwards of 180 endnotes each. A number of complex interactions between European and Maori are given in fascinating detail, explaining why a blanket held such cultural appeal, or which Maori women embraced high fashion, maybe visited London or had gowns made there for them. It all makes for a rich history.

The chapter on the balls and parties of the mid to late 19th century presents insights into the value of such social occasions judged by the extent and expense of preparation, the challenges of travel ( maybe hours on horseback with crinoline wires folded over and strapped to the saddle) and the reason such dance parties might last all through the night -- who would want to ride the homeward journey through the dark and cold when you could wait for a hearty breakfast then set off at dawn so as to start the day's work back at home.

We are left to imagine what the actual dances at such gatherings were like - in itself a subject full of interest and cross-cultural interactions. The effects of fashion on men's dress, and what children wore across the century, are also left to one side. For me the most extraordinary account is of Joseph and Mary-Ann Jewell who were with others wrecked off the Auckland Islands in 1866, and stranded there for 18 months. During that time they fashioned and made clothes from sealskin, using needles carved from albatross bone with a penknife ( and later, after their rescue, gave lectures on their experiences while wearing the very clothing, thereby earning hamdsome fees, which seems fair enough). That has to be testament to the intrepid and imaginative survival skills of how clothes are fashioned in a new environment. We cut our coats according to our cloth.\"

- Jennifer Shennan

Format: Hardback
Price: $70.00