An excellent source for the early 1790's fashions is Heideloff's "Gallery of Fashion" published circa 1793-1802. From 1793-1800 is available on microfilm as part of the "History of Women Card Catalog. Many universities hold this. There are some websites that have some of the plates, some in the original color. Yummy! A few plates from the first year were reproduced in Sitwell's "Gallery of Fashion" which was a brief history of the journal and included some info and reproductions from its successor and more famous "Ackermann's Repository" Jane Austen may have seen some of the plates. Very few survive as it was published in possibly fewer than 1,000 per monthly issue. Each issue was small--usually two plates per issue with detailed(for the time)descriptions of the fashion or fashions in each plate. Apparently subscribers shared the plates with friends who couldn't afford the steep subsciption price. The plates were hand-colored with metals, jewelry, etc, picked out in real gold and silver paint.
It was published in London. Would love to see Dover Books republish some or all of the plates and have recommended this at the Dover website as Austenites would find it of use, as well as a great source of"really existing fashions"(as the original publication claimed)of the 1790's which is greatly ignored by costume historians. It is an excellent chronicle of a transitional time in fashion during revolutionary times and deserves more study, I think. Cindy Abel _______________________________________________ h-costume mailing list h-costume@mail.indra.com http://mail.indra.com/mailman/listinfo/h-costume
