Monday, April 28, 2014

Outfit currently styled for the 1890's












From the seller:

We are pleased to offer for your consideration stunning, absolutely glorious and feminine! really museum quality

circa 1880's Rare Victorian Wine Red - Burgundy Sculptured Velour & Silk Satin 2 - Piece Costume Suit Dress

features:
slim - fitted patterned velour BODICE embellished with graduated pleated front silk satin plastrons, hand - knotted silk net with tassels from shoulder to the front and back center to accentuate slim waist, velvet tassels along the edge of upright collar , corset boning in the seams, elongated tailed - back to lay over the bustle, tight slim sleeves with elevated silk satin head, 15 buttons down front closure
and
A - line siluette patterned velour SKIRT with heavily draped silk satin bottom, three - layered silk full bustle back and back hooks.
The skirt is fully lined in olive satin and burgundy satin.
The bodice inside is shown on the last picture.

Please, look at all the details of the dress.

Unsized, looks like size XS or S, but please, follow only measurement shown in description and compare with your regular garment to prevent any problems.

Measurements. approximately:
30" - 31" - bust
26" waist
14" - shoulders
19" - length from center back to tip of the tailed back of bodice
17" - length of bodice in front
22" - length of sleeves
39" - length of skirt
8" - width of drapery

We do not however have the original bustle cage or padding.

The dress came from the famous San Francisco Bay area auction and they never inform us about item history or previous owners.

The lot was titled: Sculptured Velour and Satin Victorian Dress and we trust them.

The suit / dress is in perfect antique condition commensurable to the more than 130 years old garment: although the velvet is strong and literally in excellent undamaged condition, the silk satin is very fragile from the age with tears on the back part of the skirt and sleeve heads; one minor overstitched tear on the lower front loop (bodice), pic.10, one lower front button is missing (pic.10), a couple of velour tassels on the collar edges are missing; the left lower corner of silk plastron is unstitched; we don't see more problems with velour, it is still very strong, with no tears or holes.
We did not removed any pins on the silk satin back in a reason not to damage this beauty - overall unique pristine condition for more than 130 years old garment!

Please, examine all 12 pictures as a part of description.

We will list today more true vintage dresses, and will be happy to combine auctions for reduced shipping charge.

Please, note: we are not experts and try to describe each item in our best ability, but possible we did not figure something very important to you - please, email us with any questions.

We also invite yo to visit our other auctions for more interesting and rare items: you never know what you will find

Thank you for looking!


From Me:

I....

Yeah, okay.

So..it's velvet not velour. It's also called cut velvet, not sculptured.

Anyway, the dress is currently styled to the early 1890's (1892 ish). However, it's pretty clear that it was a late 1880's dress at some point in it's life. It looks like the lady that owned this dress just took some silk and added puffy sleeves over her existing sleeves (which makes total sense if you are like pretty much everyone I know and loathe taking sleeves out of a garment). She also redid the back of the skirt, slightly, to take out the bustle (which might have been where she got the matching silk from for the puffy sleeves.)

2 comments:

  1. It's still pretty, but I bet it was a _gorgeous_ bustle dress. ;-)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Amazingly, this one isn't quite my taste. I can see where others might want to wear it - possibly with a lovely black lace veil attached to a cute little hat?

      Delete