The beautiful Madame Recamier (Francois Gerard, c. 1800) using her expensive shawl to add luxury and sensuality to a very simple muslin gown. Fashionable ladies were spoken of as being ‘well draped’ rather than well dressed, and in Paris there were those like Madame Gardel, performer of the shawl dance, who would give instruction in the graces of the shawl.
SLENDER DIAPHANOUS DRESSES meant that there was now nowhere for pockets, and the ‘reticule’ – or ‘ridicule’ as it was christened by the satirists – was born along with a coterie of new accessories. These details added interest to a simple gown and their exotic nature spoke of the wealth, connections and taste necessary to procure them, whilst the delicate movements necessary to handle them helped to display a woman’s pretty plump arms and dainty hands.
At most points in the preceding centuries skirts had been capacious enough to be able to accommodate small bags or separate ‘pockets’ tucked away within the folds, but the slender lines and diaphanous muslins of the 1800s rendered them redundant. Clearly ladies could not simply carry their possessions, and on the suggestion that Athenian ladies had once transported their possessions in small decorative bags, the reticule became the ‘must have’ accessory of 1800.
Muffs had grown in size when gowns grew narrower as though the soft bulk of a fur or swansdown muff drew favourable comparison to the slender silhouette. White swansdown was de rigueur for evening, whilst richer and warmer fur or sealskin would match fur-trimmed pelisses and cloaks by day. The capacious size made them handy for concealing private items like billetsdoux, and it is likely that they were used to carry various personal items even if not sanctioned to do so.
The natural antecedent to the reticule was the knotting bag which, ostensibly to carry the accoutrements for the fashionable hobby, became something of a display item in the 1790s. It provided a pretty showcase for the ladies’ knotting and needlework talents – which Mr Bingley in Pride and Prejudice considered a great female accomplishment – and as Lady Mary Coke noted as early as 1769: ‘she had a knotting-bag, embroidered, hanging to her arm – “tho indeed” said she “I never knott, but the bag is convenient for one’s gloves and Fan.”’
In 1799 The Times reported ‘the total abjuration of the female pocket… every fashionable fair carries her purse in her work-bag’. With the addition of longer handles and having been renamed ‘indispensables’, reticules were also featured in November that year in a fashion plate in The Gallery of Fashion. In France the knotting association was immortalised in the name, derived from reticulum (the Latin for ‘net’). ‘Reticule’ took over as the fashionable name probably because of the glamorous classical motifs of the Parisian reticules made of cardboard or lacquered tin in the shape of Grecian urns suitable for the most elegant priestess.
White silk reticule with border embroidered with floral designs and silver spangles, and tassels on each point (c. 1790–1810).
Reticules could be bought from milliners ready made, but many ladies enjoyed making their own. In infinite variety reticules could match with a gown, Spencer, parasol, gloves or shoes. Usually in silk or, after 1810, increasingly in velvet, they were rectangular, lozenge shaped, or even during the Napoleonic wars shaped like the military sabretache, each with a tassel from the lowest point. Framed bags also became popular, the metalwork providing not only a secure alternative to the drawstring, but an opportunity to add moulded designs of sphinxes or classical lion masks. Within the first three decades of the century they became a major vehicle for female artistic and even, in the case of the silk reticules distributed by the Ladies’ Society for the Relief of Negro Slaves, political expression.
Eliza Farren, Countess of Derby (after Sir Thomas Lawrence, c. 1792) wearing a furtrimmed cloak with large matching muff.
The large picture hats of the 1790s gave way to a far less extravagant look. Hair became simple, close to the head and was often closely cropped in little curls decorated with a fillet or bandeau, or for evening, a simple spray of ostrich plumes. Without the need to balance on a large cushion of hair, hats took on a wide variety of styles, many closely fitted to the head.
Women also took on the fashion for tall crowned hats like the military shako. Hoods in various forms came in at the turn of the century as homage to the Grecian caul, a cloth or net that covered the hair in an elongated shape at the back. There is an engraving of Jane’s Aunt Perrot looking formidable in a dark silk hood.
‘Promenade Dresses’ (Ackermann’s Repository, June 1811). Little face veils adorned a variety of hat styles and were thought a fashion essential by Mrs Elton in Emma who considered Emma’s wedding ‘extremely shabby, and very inferior to her own … very little white satin, very few lace veils; a most pitiful business!’
Straw was very popular for morning or informal wear, and once a method of splitting straw was perfected, the English straw trade rose successfully to the challenge of replacing the delicate Italian leghorn straw that had been embargoed during the wars with France. Smarter afternoon and promenade hats were of fabrics shaped with wire, and evening styles were silk.
Little could seem more feminine than the bonnet, but the close-fitting style was originally masculine, based on a military helmet.
The casquet à la Minerve (Le Bon Genre, 1810).
‘Walking Dress’ (La Belle Assemblée May 1813). ‘Short dress of jacconet muslin… Over this our fair pedestrians throw a sky-blue scarf. Bonnet of white-willow shavings, with a flower and wreath of sky-blue. Gloves and sandals of sky-blue kid. Necklace and earrings of white cornelian. Johnston parasol. This elegant appendage to the walking costume, is also of sky-blue silk, and finished with a rich and deep fringe; it has very recently made its appearance, and is already a general favorite.’
The casquet à la Minerve first appeared in the opera La Caravanne du Caire in 1797. It was a helmet of black velvet trimmed with a laurel wreath and ostrich plumes, and created a segue between the Egyptian influence and the coal-scuttle bonnet.
The 1790s also saw the rise of the ‘oriental’ style of a silk turban topped with nodding ostrich plumes. Jane borrowed a Marmalouc (or Mameluke) cap, which was ‘all the fashion now’ in January 1799. It was inspired by the success of Nelson’s Nile Campaign in 1798, and a Nelson cap in Coquelicot velvet was one of the many articles of Nelsoniana worn to commemorate the hero.
The Hats of 1810 (Haller von Hallerstein, 1810). The bonnet brim grew exponentially until 1810 when the ladies who wore them were satirised as ‘invisibles’. The central lady also carries an oversized trefoil fan.
Although it was beyond the range of most ladies to construct a hat, they delighted in trimming and re-trimming them to emulate the latest styles. A vogue for artificial flowers and fruits appeared in the late 1790s. In a letter to Cassandra Jane wrote:
Flowers are very much worn, & Fruit is still more the thing. – Elizth has a bunch of Strawberries, & I have seen Grapes, cherries, Plumbs, & Apricots – There are likewise Almonds & raisins, French plumbs & Tamarinds at the Grocers, but I have never seen any of them in hats’
In her next letter she adds ‘besides I cannot help thinking that it is more natural to have flowers grow out of the head than fruit. Caps were frequently worn indoors, especially by older married ladies and Jane was very fond of wearing one even when only twenty-three. Her niece Caroline recalled:
she always wore a cap – Such was the custom with ladies who were not quite young – at least of a morning – but I never saw her without one, to the best of my remembrance either morning or evening.
‘Half Dress’ (Ackermann’s Repository, January 1820). A veritable fruit bowl of a hat worn with a fawn silk gown and tucker.
In December 1798 when Jane is deeply involved in making a new cap, she writes to Cassandra:
I took the liberty a few days ago of asking your black velvet bonnet to lend me its cawl, which it very readily did, and by which I have been enabled to give a considerable improvement of dignity to my cap, which was before too nidgetty to please me. I shall wear it on Thursday, but I hope you will not be offended with me for following your advice as to its ornaments only in part. I still venture to retain the narrow silver round it, Put twice round without any bow, and instead of the black military feather shall put in the Coquelicot one, as being smarter; and besides Coquelicot is to be all the fashion this winter. After the ball, I shall probably make it entirely black…
Scanty gowns were frequently chilly and a Spencer – far less popular in Europe where the fur trimmed Hussar jacket was preferred – was not always the answer especially with evening dress. The shawl provided an elegant way to add a little warmth without disguising the line of the gown or the figure beneath. First seen in London in around 1786, the shawl captured the imagination and remained popular in various forms for over a century.
Draping the shawl fittingly in the style of a classical statue was an art that reflected innate good taste and had the advantage of providing a frame for the most appealing assets whilst drawing a veil over those less attractive. But the shawl was not always praised: in 1806 La Belle Assemblée wrote, ‘it is wonderful that the shawl should ever have found its path to fashionable adoption… it turns any female not beautiful and elegant into an absolute dowdy. It is the very contrast to the flowing Grecian costume …’
‘Morning Dress’ (Ackermann’s Repository, 1819). Jane always wore a cap ‘as they save me a world of torment as to hairdressing’.
The Parasol became increasingly popular, not only for its exotic ‘oriental’ status but for practical reasons. As it became fashionable for ladies to spend more time outdoors the parasol became essential to preserve their pale complexions from strong sunlight. Silk parasols came in pretty pastel shades to complement the outfit or matching the colour of the reticule. The pagoda parasol was very fashionable with the fabric extended in a point towards the ferrule so that when open they had an elegant curved shape, and they were often enhanced by a knotted fringe. The fan or marquise parasol was also seen, its stem hinged so that the somewhat flatter fabric or paper leaf could be used as a vertical screen.
Always an excellent needlewoman, Jane Austen worked this scarf in satin stitch on white muslin, c. 1800.
Umbrellas – most often green – were becoming useful especially as part of spa dress where the usual foul weather expedient of taking a sedan wasn’t an option because walking was an obligatory part of the cure. In Persuasion Captain Wentworth refers to his umbrella when he tells Anne Elliot, ‘I have equipped myself for Bath already.’
Always important status items, gloves remained usual for formal occasions for both men and women, who were admonished to wear them in church and at the theatre, but ‘ladies should never dine with their gloves on – unless their hands are not fit to be seen.’ Men would buy theirs from glove makers who would also provide their buckskin breeches. Made in beautiful quality leathers like doeskin or York tan, male styles were short, little beyond the wrist for all except riding gloves, and unobtrusive in neutral colours.
Madame Rivière (Ingres, 1805). In France the imported British cashmere shawls were heavily levied with taxes and on more than one occasion Napoleon in a fit of pique had whole shipments of shawls destroyed. Whatever her husband’s political frustrations, it made no difference to Josephine: an inveterate shawl lover, she collected nearly four hundred, each costing 15–20,000 francs.
Throughout the eighteenth century women’s gloves had usually been leather and supplied by a glove maker. But as gloves began to be made of fabrics complementary to the outfit, increasingly they were bought from milliners. In the late 1790s there was a vogue for kid gloves printed with a variety of ingenious designs from elegant all over prints, to pretty hand painted designs such as a lady dressing a lamb with a garland of flowers. White was universal in the softest leathers including kid, chickenskin or limerick – the skin of unborn calves – which was reputed to make the wearer’s hands and arms enviably white, clear, soft and smooth. Neutral shades of buff and stone, yellow, lilac and pastel shades were fashionable according to the colour of the gown. Black gloves were a statement of mourning until the 1820s when they became acceptable for fashionable wear in town.
The Gallery of Fashion, 1796. The lady on the right demonstrates the vertical leaf of a marquise or ‘fan’ parasol.
The Coquette and Her Daughters (Debucourt, c. 1800). He is peeking at her prodigious bosom round the marquise parasol that he carries in the same hand as her pink reticule, whilst she carries a tiny fan.
‘Promenade Dresses’ (Ackermann’s Repository, July 1810). Writing from Bath in May 1801, Jane observed, ‘black gauze cloaks are worn as much as anything’. A similar effect could be achieved by netting, as Miss Tilney’s friend Miss Andrews did in Northanger Abbey: ‘she is netting, herself the sweetest cloak you can conceive’.
Generally elbow-length, longer gloves often had the problem of slipping and wrinkling. Glove strings first appeared in the 1780s; they were ribbons tied or sometimes fastened with a diamond buckle ‘high over the elbow to preserve the arm in beauty for womanhood’. After Waterloo a new prudery dawned in reaction to the freedoms of the revolutionary period and gloves became extremely long, almost in compensation for the short puffed sleeves that were still de rigueur for evening.
Jane does not specify the length of them but she bought some ‘light and pretty’ coloured gloves for herself and Cassandra in May 1812 for 4 shillings, which must have been an exceptional bargain as she writes: ‘everybody at chawton will be hoping & predicting that they cannot be good for anything, and their worth certainly remains to be proved, but I think they look very well.’
The fan was the essential evening accessory as well as being pretty; they were extremely practical at the assemblies, which with their increasing popularity were often tremendously crowded, hot and airless. More importantly, clever use of a fan could draw attention to the owner’s beautiful eyes whilst concealing her pretty smile and, depicting classical, romantic, or fashionable scenes, convey something of her innate taste and sophistication.
Fans, which had become an important accessory during the eighteenth century, remained so, but increasingly the hand-painted biblical or pastoral scenes were replaced by printed political messages. Political fans played their part in the French Revolution, spreading propaganda or concealing hidden messages of aristocratic support, and it was said that Charlotte Corday carried a fan in one hand as she plunged the knife into Marat.
Mademoiselle Rivière (Ingres, c. 1804). Her exceptionally long suede fingerless gloves are fastened with glove strings and she wears a snake-style boa of white fox..
In England a fan of 1789 was issued as a patriotic gesture in support of King George III after another bout of illness, ‘On the King’s Happy Recovery’. Fans celebrated Nelson’s sea victories and followed each development in the war, giving details of the ships involved, those captured and sunk. Other fans were ivory or bone with incredibly intricate carving to look like muslin. There was a system of fan etiquette designating the correct ways to use and hold a fan to enhance the beauty and grace of the hands. There was also a language of the fan, probably derived from The Speaking Fan published by Charles Badini in 1797. Displaying the ‘Rudiments of Fanology’, it began as a party game but developed into a tool of romantic intrigue. However, it is for concealment that Catherine Morland uses her fan at the Cotillion Ball in Northanger Abbey when the boorish John Thorpe is in sight: ‘that she might not appear to observe or expect him, she kept her eyes intently fixed on her fan.’
With the rise of the reticule, fans became smaller at the beginning of the nineteenth century, and those displaying images of the sights of the Grand Tour were particularly popular. English taste remained modest, with church fans printed with psalms, educational fans with maps or botanical diagrams, and art fans depicting famous works, although pierced ivory brisé fans remained most popular. Cockade fans that opened up into a full circle became popular from 1808, some including a spy glass in the centre, with crape fans embroidered with silver and spangles leading the fashion in 1817.
‘Watering Place Morning Dress’ (The Gallery of Fashion, October 1795). Pea green gloves, green silk handkerchief tied over the hat, green sash and shoes show that accessories could be used to quite striking effect to pull an outfit together.
Early nineteenthcentury fans. Carved brisé fans were hugely popular, as were paper or silk fans with neoclassical motifs.
Jane refers to her white fan in her letters but ivory fans remained the most usual, possibly because they were also used as dance fans to make a note of the names of dance partners. This is most likely what William is doing ‘working away his partner’s fan as if for life’ at the ball in Mansfield Park. Little jewellery was worn with the style à l’anglaise but watches began to be worn suspended from the waistline, men adding a fob on the opposite side to create symmetry. The French Revolution caused many ladies to get rid of their jewels in a desperate attempt to avoid la guillotine, their diamonds replaced with neoclassical pearls, amethysts and cameos. These they wore literally from head to foot – from their classically inspired tiaras, golden girdles, and slave bangles to the rings on their toes.
‘Carriage Dress’ (Ackermann’s Repository, January 1810). The erminetrimmed cape and matching cap would be snug for travelling and the watch pinned at her elevated waistline would help her keep track of the time!
Madame de Pompadour had carved her own cameos, but for those less talented and less wealthy Josiah Wedgewood created a method for making porcelain cameos. The passion for cameos inspired a flood of neoclassical jewellery that drew inspiration from all parts of the ancient world as dictated by the latest discoveries at Herculaneum, Pompeii, and after the Nile campaign, Egypt.
The topaz crosses given to Jane and Cassandra by their brother Charles.
In 1800 the Morning Post declared amethyst and topaz to be ‘preferable to all others’ for necklaces and earrings. It was perfect then, that in May 1801 Jane wrote to tell Cassandra that their brother Charles ‘has been buying gold chains and topaze crosses for us; - he must be well scolded’. She must have been pleased because she commemorated the occasion by having Fanny Price receive a topaz cross from her brother William in similar circumstances. Unlike Charles, William did not supply a chain (at first Fanny wore the cross on a ribbon) but Mary Crawford gives her a gold chain ‘prettily worked’. These gold chains made a less costly alternative to strings of pearls, which were fashionably draped between cameos at the girdle and bust-line.
Queen Louise Augusta of Prussia (Vigée Le Brun, 1802). In 1805 the Journal des Dames wrote: ‘a fashionable lady wears cameos at her girdle, cameos in her necklace, cameos on each of her bracelets, a cameo on her tiara. The antique stones are more fashionable than ever, but in default of them one may employ engraved shells.’
In La Nouvelle Héloïse, Rousseau had glorified sentiment and virtue, and advocated sentimental jewellery over artificial finery, especially for day wear. There were brooches painted with ladies weeping over tombstones surrounded by willow trees, parures of ivy leaves and owls for remembrance, or snakes for eternity. Hair work was a more literal way of commemorating the departed, with bracelets or watch chains woven from the hair of the deceased, or strands to form entwined initials sealed under crystal. Only the most extreme wore one of their teeth as a tie pin!