Hope you’re having a lovely weekend!
Here’s some pretty things from a magazine in my collection that’s over 100 years old- McCall’s Magazine from December 1908. There’s lots of lovely hats- I’m a sucker for Edwardian millinery… or really anything to do with the fashion, actually.
Click on any of the images to be taken to a larger file on my Flickr.
I’ve added a few of these images to my CafePress shop, too.
Hope they’ve inspired you for your winter millinery creations!
I’ve been working on and off on a new pattern that I started last year. No, it’s not a corset, but I will say that the late 1890s and early 1900s are inspiring me a lot lately in view of this project.
Here’s some very pretty corset ads from the November 1905 issue of The Delineator to share with you.
This ad is beautifully drawn, but also kind of humourous. If only this lady knew her corset was visible to the outside world by her shadow! I’ll gladly take her jacket and hat, too.
I absolutely adore the line art drawings of this period. The ones on this WB Corsets ads are so beautiful and romantic, especially with the cute little cherubs and garlands of flowers, and the beautiful gathers and bows on the lingerie.
If you’re interested in making underwear of this period, Truly Victorian has recently come out with an S Curve corset pattern and an Edwardian Lingerie pattern. Heather’s patterns are amazing- I’m a big fan and customer, so I can’t recommend them enough. I have purchased both patterns and they’re in my stash just waiting to be made. Images like these make me wish I had time to start them!
Today is the centennial of the sinking of the great ocean liner, the Titanic. There has been many interesting articles circulating around blogs, in the news, and on television to commemorate and remember this horrible accident. Today I’d like to share an interesting glimpse into the lives of one of the Titanic survivors and her baby, who she was pregnant with at the time of the sinking of the Titanic.
John Jacob Astor was known to be the most wealthy passenger on the Titanic, and was bound for home from his honeymoon with his new (much younger) wife, Madeline. At the time of their marriage he was 47 and she was 18, and their marriage was quite a topic of gossip in their day. John Jacob Astor would not survive the sinking of the Titanic, but his wife did and did give birth to the child. This article from McCall’s Magazine from 1913 takes a peek into Madeline and her baby’s lives.
The article does not go into detail of the event of the sinking of the Titanic, but it does say the following, and tell of how it impacted the lives of Madeline and the baby:
“The details of the terrible night of April 14 are too fresh in everyone’s memory to need repetition here. Colonel and Mrs. Astor were in their stateroom when the crash came. They dressed leisurely and went on deck, where Colonel Astor lifted his wife into a lifeboat, kissing her tenderly, and saying, “Don’t worry, dear, all will be well.
Mercifully, she did not know, during those cold, rain-soaked hours until the ‘Carpathia’ came, that the supply of lifeboats had been criminally inadequate, and that her husband had been one of the 1,475 who went to the bottom. Her maid was with her, and she saved her tiny toy Pomeranian.”
I will let you read the rest of the article for yourself, as I think you will find it quite interesting to hear a little bit of what happened to these survivors. Click on any of the images for a larger version that you can read.
You can read more about Madeline Talmage Astor at these links:
And John Jacob Astor VI (The Astor Baby) on Wikipedia
If you’re following me on Facebook you may have seen a photo I posted this week of a lovely find I recently received in the mail- several years of bound Ladies Home Journal magazines. I have been itching to share some of the content with you, so today we’ve got hats and bonnets from the April, 1897 issue. The layout of this page made it quite hard to share a scan (the magazines are a large format), and the layout was bizarre with very small pictures, so I have transcribed the article here, complete with the remastered pictures a little larger than they appeared in the original.
The fashionable materials for this Easter’s hats and bonnets are chip, manilla, Leghorn, Neapolitan, Madagascar and English straw, and all the straw braids, especially those imitating satin. Black velvet is largely used for trimming with moiré and stain ribbons, deftly looped. Ostrich tips and long feathers are in vogue, though flowers are given preference over everything. The big Parma violets, as well as the enormous roses and poppies that were so generally used last season, continue to obtain, while camellias, tuberoses, white lilies, lilies-of-the-valley, blue hortensias, ragged robins and primroses are counted as quite new.
An extremely smart little bonnet (no. 1) is made of dull red straw, the front being turned back, exposing the hair, somewhat after the fashion of a Scotch cap. Very slightly to one side of the front is a bunch of black ostrich plumes, caught in place by a Rhinestone clasp. The simplicity of this bonnet is its special charm, while its style is cited to show that the woman who looks best when her hat is off her face has been considered. A little bonnet (No. 2), which may or may not have ties, has a small frame covered with a drapery of white satin embroidered with jet, turquoises, and silver spangles. It is raised on the left side and decorated with pink camellias and one large black silk poppy.
Click the link below to continue reading. If you see no link, you’re in the right place!
I got a fun little package in the mail today of a few lovely old magazines. On the back cover of one is this lovely image on the ad for corsets from 1911. I thought I’d share with you! There’s a corner torn off, but it was too lovely to not share on that account. Click on the image for a larger version
I am particularly amused by one sentence of the description of the W.B. Reduso corset:
“The measurements at the hips and abdomen are reduced from one to five inches, by the scientific shaping and placing of gores.”
Emphasis on that last bit, since that’s the part that struck me.
When I was looking at the available corset patterns of this period I was taken by the variety of versions available. I went with one that’s straighter, with no set in gores, similar to the version on the left in this ad, posted by Jen Thompson of Festive Attyre on her website, but I noticed the version in the Corsets and Crinolines book has several gores to be set in. I am entirely a corset novice and am not knowledgeable about them, but am interested in this period description of them. Look at the construction at the one on the right! Talk about piecing! Absolutely fascinating to me.
I believe the sizing on here, 18 to 30, or 19 to 36, were the waist size measure of the corset, not including “spring” at the back. Does anyone know? If not including spring you’d add 2-4 inches to that measure, if I understand correctly, which would make the waist sizes seem much more reasonable by modern standards. If there’s any corset historians out there, I’d love to hear your input on this and the optional construction with gores of this period.
I am pleased to say that the pattern I drafted for the first 1910s pattern for Wearing History, a blouse, is just finished after a lot of time in preparation several revisions to get it “just so”- but I’ve still got a ways to go before it’s ready to release. Got to make instructions and all that first, of course! But one step closer! Woohoo! Hopefully pretty soon here I’ll have some pretty photos to share with you of a sneak peek 