MikeOxon's Pre-Grouping Blog

Interesting post Mike. When talking about the upper-middle and upper classes colours were another key; the dark heavy colours of the middle decades of the century giving way to pastels, especially shades of green, though the older generations continued to wear the darker shades. Top hats shrunk in height too, but again the older generation tended to continue wearing the taller hats. Of course at any given time there were always a percentage of ladies in mourning dress. Lower classes were obviously less flamboyant with dark colours prevailing.

Thank you, Buckjumper.  The whole subject of colour in the 19th century is fascinating, especially after the aniline dyes were synthesised - the most famous example being 'mauve'.

 

Unless I start making my own figures, I'm not going to be able to do much other than choosing colours, so your advice is very welcome.

 

Mike

If you ever happen to be in Bath, a visit to the fashion museum there would be very useful for seeing lots of costumes like the ones above first hand - there is even an opportunity to try on a corset but I will not be posting the evidence! It does not make a big thing of it but if you are a National Trust member you can get in free as well.

A great example of how an interest in model railways can lead to the search for knowledge in seemingly unconnected areas

I'll pass on the corset, KH1

 

In one of the books I've been reading, I read this account: ""I was placed, at the age of fifteen, at a fashionable school in London, and there it was the custom for the waists of the pupils to be reduced one inch per month. When I left school at seventeen my waist measured only thirteen inches, it having been formerly twenty three inches.".  Although the medical profession had been pointing out the dangers since early in the century, the fashion persisted until the 20th-century.

 

Indeed, Bedders, one thing leads to another.  In my case, the interest in 19th-century railways arose from some ancestry research, which revealed several engine drivers amongst my forebears, including one who even had an interview with Mr G J Churchward, following some misdemeanor!

Interesting post Mike. When talking about the upper-middle and upper classes colours were another key; the dark heavy colours of the middle decades of the century giving way to pastels, especially shades of green....

 

I guess this may be (at least in part) due to the development of artificial dyes in the mid part of the 19th century. 

Thanks for the tips on the books, Mike, the "Dame fashion" sounds like it includes Edwardian times so just the thing for me (your setting is 1880s-1890s if I remember right?).

 

This site is also useful for Victorian and Edwardian fashion: http://www.tudorlinks.com/treasury/articles/index.html

 

I was intrigued by your quote saying "altered beyond recognition during the past twenty-four years". I wonder why 24 years exactly, was there some main event, or just the last time something was published on the topic? In extension of that, your mention of the Savoy is fascinating - as is the cycling: I had no idea women were cycling at that time. No doubt some eyebrows will have been raised among  senior gentlemen!

Thank you for the 'Tudorlink' reference, Mikkel.  It is very useful as it gives an overview of the changes that took place in each decade.  On thinking further, I suspect that the '24 years' may refer back to the opening of the Savoy restaurant, from the end of the period of the Dame Fashion book (1912).  Possibly 'two dozen' seemed a more natural number, then, than the '25' we would tend to use.

 

I've not really fixed my setting yet and, like most model railways, it will probably be somewhat flexible, depending on the whims of what I want to build!  Since I have a Dean 4-2-2, this pushes me forward to1895 at least

 

Stylistically, I like the Dean locomotives and coaches, immediately before the Churchward revolution, with its 'indecent' display of undergear and coarse angularity.  Even the straight-framed 4-4-0s seem a little inelegant