Dress, brown and tan silk taffeta with cuirass bodice and bustle, c. 1883, detail of bustle

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Creator

Unknown

Date Created

c. 1883

Subject

Costume; Clothing; Main garments; Dresses

Description

c. 1883. Brown and tan silk taffeta three-piece dress, with a front-buttoning, long-sleeved cuirass bodice extending over the hips, a floor-length underskirt with a train, and a bustled draped short overskirt.

The bodice is made in the figure-hugging cuirass style, flowing snugly over the hips into a peplum with no waist seam. It has six brown silk taffeta pieces: two front panels with two flared darts each going from the bust to the hem and a horizontal dart between the second dart and the side seam that defines the waist above the hips, two side-back panels with curved back seams, and two center-back panels joined with a center-back seam. It opens in front with twenty silk-wrapped and crocheted domed buttons. The high neck has a 3.8 cm / 1.5 in. high knife pleated frill as a standing collar. The bodice is flat lined with brown cotton, and the peplum has a 5.1 cm / 2 in. wide facing of brown polished cotton. The sleeves are full-length, with a curved two-seam construction. They are smoothly inserted into the scye with no gathers, and are tight-fitting to the wrist.

The floor-length brown silk taffeta underskirt has a train, with all the fullness in back. It has seven shaped panels: three are cut to fit smoothly to the waist in front and at the sides, and four are cartridge pleated at the back. Interior tapes pull the bulk of the skirt behind the legs. It has one hook and eye at the waist in back and is lined at the hem only, with brown polished cotton. The tan silk taffeta overskirt is made of four shaped panels, unlined, draped low in front like an apron to mid-calf and elaborately drawn up in back with interior tapes to form a bustle. A large constructed bow with streamers is tucked beneath the bustle. At the top, the overskirt has a small panel of polished brown cotton at center back with a drawstring to pull the fabric into a bustled shape; this is covered by the bodice peplum which hooks to it to hold the elements together.

The entire dress relies on an interplay of brown and tan taffeta for decorative effect. Bands of bias fabric alternating tan and brown go from the back waist, over the shoulder, to the front waist, ending in elaborate bows. The sleeves are finished with matching banded trim at cuffs. The bodice hem is finished with a tan pleated band. The skirts are trimmed with the contrasting fabric in a variety of pleating and edge-finishing techniques. Machine-sewn and hand-sewn.

Extent

Bust: 86.4 cm / 34 in.
Waist: 62.2 cm / 24.5 in.
Shoulder: 13.3 cm / 5.25 in.
Sleeve: 55.9 cm / 22 in.
Hem (underskirt): 288.3 cm / 113.5 in.
Length (underskirt front): 106.7 cm / 42 in.
Length (underskirt back): 129.5 cm / 51 in.

Provenance

Gift of the Nims family. Notes in the original files indicate this is part of a group gift of the Nims family of Keene. Although it is credited as the 1851 wedding dress of matriarch Elizabeth Hosking Nims, stylistically this dress is clearly decades later and is in not a remade 1851 dress. If it is a wedding dress, then based on its cut and details it would be that of Alice Nims, who married in 1883.

Museum Number

73a,b,c

Publisher

University of New Hampshire Library

Medium

Silk taffeta, cotton

Contributor

Astrida Schaeffer, photographer/curator

Date Digitized

4-23-2019

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License

Comments

The Irma G. Bowen Historic Clothing Collection digital catalog was produced by the UNH Library Digital Collection Initiative, supported in part by a grant from the Mooseplate program and New Hampshire State Council on the Arts. Additional funding provided by the E. Ruth Buxton Stephenson Memorial Fund.
Photography copyright, Astrida Schaeffer.