How has women’s clothes represented their role in the Victorian society?
While contemporary weddings are often a symbol of love and commitment between the bride and the groom, for the history of the past, love actually played a very minor role in the majority of matrimonies that took place. In the Victorian era, marriage was not as romanticized or fairy tale-like as depicted in many novels of the time, it were seen as two families joining together forming a business deal in a beneficial arrangement or alliance. Great expectations were placed upon weddings, the wedding dress was crucial in representing the bride’s family, in terms of wealth and social status.
Due to my interest in the Victorian clothing, I took a trip to the Exeter’s Royal …show more content…
The style of this wedding dress was most popular during the 1856-1869, which was called the hoop era. The silhouette of this piece is bold and structured, with an elongated collar that rises to the height of just below the models head. The corset clings tightly to the body leaving nothing to the imagination. From this silhouette it accentuates the hourglass curve of the models body. The corset represents the Victorian era because in the 1800’s women would wear them as they were considered a great way to make a women look more attractive and curvaceous. Yet it as a torturous contraption that often caused women to faint and possibly deform their bodies. The corset was also common for forcing women to breathe with the top part of the lungs, which lead to irregular, heaving breathing. These factors link to the Victorian era because women were seen as men’s property, In the words of John Stuart Mill, “The female sex was brought up to believe that its ‘ideal of character’ was the very opposite to that of men’s ‘not self-will, and government by self-control, but submission, and yielding to the control of others" to live for others; to make complete abnegation of themselves, and to have no life but in their affections.”(Mill 1869) They felt the need to torture their bodies in order for them to be more attractive to males and be identified as ‘beautiful’ by
While contemporary weddings are often a symbol of love and commitment between the bride and the groom, for the history of the past, love actually played a very minor role in the majority of matrimonies that took place. In the Victorian era, marriage was not as romanticized or fairy tale-like as depicted in many novels of the time, it were seen as two families joining together forming a business deal in a beneficial arrangement or alliance. Great expectations were placed upon weddings, the wedding dress was crucial in representing the bride’s family, in terms of wealth and social status.
Due to my interest in the Victorian clothing, I took a trip to the Exeter’s Royal …show more content…
The style of this wedding dress was most popular during the 1856-1869, which was called the hoop era. The silhouette of this piece is bold and structured, with an elongated collar that rises to the height of just below the models head. The corset clings tightly to the body leaving nothing to the imagination. From this silhouette it accentuates the hourglass curve of the models body. The corset represents the Victorian era because in the 1800’s women would wear them as they were considered a great way to make a women look more attractive and curvaceous. Yet it as a torturous contraption that often caused women to faint and possibly deform their bodies. The corset was also common for forcing women to breathe with the top part of the lungs, which lead to irregular, heaving breathing. These factors link to the Victorian era because women were seen as men’s property, In the words of John Stuart Mill, “The female sex was brought up to believe that its ‘ideal of character’ was the very opposite to that of men’s ‘not self-will, and government by self-control, but submission, and yielding to the control of others" to live for others; to make complete abnegation of themselves, and to have no life but in their affections.”(Mill 1869) They felt the need to torture their bodies in order for them to be more attractive to males and be identified as ‘beautiful’ by