Object-Description

            Based off of my methodology designed from the first object exercise the steps that will be included in the methodology will be 1st observation, 2^nd step will be the imagination phase, 3^rd step will be the analysis phase. The object that I was assigned was a women’s honeymoon/newlywed dress called a Trousseau dress. My dress was dated back to 1888 and was made in Paris, France.

            The first step is the observation phase. During my observation of my object I found many exciting things. My first observation was that the dress was done professional by a seamstress and it was done very well. The dress was two pieces, the top section and the bottom section. The dress was made at the end of the bustle period, thus the dress had less emphasis on the backside but still did draw attention to the bustle region. The dress looked like it had some padding on the back side; however not as much padding that was associated with the bustle period. The bottom of the dress measured 38.5” from the waist to the feet.

            The top went from the shoulders down to the high waist and the bottom of the dress started from the high waist and went down to her feet. The top of the dress had a v-neckline in the front that would reveal more of her cleavage and the v-neckline was also present in the back of the dress. On the top of the dress on the front there was small round buttons in the center that looked that they closed the bodice of the dress. The top of the dress was very form fitting, it was boned and would have sat very snug on the young woman. We were unable to determine what kind of material was used for the boning of the dress; however we could assume that it was from whale because of how expensive the dress looked. The top measured 18.5” from the top center of the V-neckline to the waist. The top also measured 13” from the center of the top to the side, which would be roughly a 26” waist measurement from one side of the dress to the other side. The dress went from the shoulder to the elbow of the young woman.

            The dress was woven and made out of silk and also had machine factored lace throughout the dress, which demonstrated that the young lady had a lot of money. The colors that were used in the dress were green, darker cream, and red. The creamer looked darker because one could tell that the dress was older thus the cream fabric darkened a tad, but still the colors looked amazing with one another. The dress was made of silk ribbons that were the color of green and cream. Also I noticed that there were red rose buds on the cream fabric. The colors of the fabric were a pattern in which the cream with the red rose buds was alternated with green silk. The amount of colored ribbon looked varied, in which roughly the cream fabric looked approximately 2” wide and the green ribbon looked approximately 1” wide.   The same pattern of silk ribbon was also found on the top of the dress as well, therefore the top and bottom of the dress mirrored one another.

            The dress had a considerable amount of lace on it as compared to the other Trousseau dress. The neckline of the dress was trimmed in lace along with the center front opening for the bodice. Lace was also designed on the sleeve of the arm in which it went from the elbow to the wrist. The skirt of the dress also has draped lace throughout the patterns of silk, the largest amount of lace on the skirt was found on the backside where the bustle was placed. The bottom of the skirt was also trimmed with lace as well. The color of the lace was cream which matched the cream ribbon that was used throughout the dress.

            The next phase is the imagination phase, during this phase I place myself in the shoes of the young woman who bought this dress and think about what the dress would feel like to wear. Unfortunately when we saw our objects we were unable to feel the dress, however since the dress is made out of silk it would be safe to assume that the dress would feel nice on the skin. My initial thought of the dress was that the skirt had a lot of fabric and material, thus I believe that skirt would feel heavy on the hips when wearing it. As compared to the top of the dress which did not look like there was as much fabric used for it. The top of the dress had built in boning and was designed to fit the woman snug, therefore when the dress was buttoned fully it would sit very tight on the woman’s waist and would naturally create a bust line, even if the woman was not fully chested. Looking at how the bottom of the dress was created, the skirt looked fuller therefore the woman squeezed herself into the top and was able to let things fall as they would in the bottom of the dress.

            The final step is the analysis phase. Based on the historical research that I did regarding a Trousseau dress, the dress was bought for the honeymoon of the young lady. Since the dress was made in Paris, France we assume that the dress was purchased while she was on her honeymoon. The woman wore this dressing during the afternoon because of how the dress was cut. Historically women would reveal more as the day went on. Therefore, it was normal for a women to start her day off more covered up then when she was changing into her afternoon outfit she would reveal more cleavage and more defined curves and this was socially acceptable. I soon began to think that in order to have multiple outfits for one day; the woman would have to be wealthy. Having the ability to change into multiple outfits throughout the day demonstrated how wealthy you were and allowed the woman to flaunt it to her friends. I am going to also take it a step further because I believe that this allowed the woman to show what social class she belonged to simply because she had the ability to change into an afternoon dress. Therefore, due to the amount of lace that was found on the dress as well as the dress being made in Paris, France the woman who owned this dress came from a wealthy background and was able to have multiple outfits per day.

            I am planning to continue expanding the historical research of the Trousseau dress. The research I did was preliminary information to give me a good grasp on my article of clothing. Therefore, I am going to next focus more on the history of the dress itself and also the social implications that were associated with the dress. I will attempt to support the claims that I drew during my analysis section.