The Victorians put their (mostly) best foot forward in this collection of period photographs. Most of the photos are obviously studio pieces and catch our ancestors at what they considered their best, but a few, like the picture of the little girl missing a coat button, seem unplanned.
The photos are grouped by decade and show men, women and children of all ages and social classes. The editor's notes are conveniently placed near the photos and contain clear and interesting details about the costumes. Together the notes and the photos provide a useful resource and fun browse for all those interested in Victorian costume and manners.
This book contains useful illustrations representing all ages and classes of American society. Ms Dalrymple wins my approval by basing some of her conclusions on dated photographs; in other words, she uses photographs as documentary evidence, not just as illustrations.
-But important source information, ie. the format of the photograph, the photographer's name and geographical location, etc. has been moved to the endnotes, and the captions consist of stating the obvious; ie. "man in patterned trousers". With a few exceptions, the captions do not explain why the photographs were selected for the book and do not enhance the illustration. In her well-written chapter introductions, the author demonstrates her knowledge of the field and uses interesting and significant quotations from primary sources. (I like the footnotes.) So I wonder... was there an editorial decision made to "dumb-down" a potentially useful piece of work?
Finally, reproduction of the photographs is adequate, but not exciting. It is sometimes difficult to see costume detail.
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The arrangement of the book is refreshingly neat. It is firstly chronological, and then subdivided into men, women and children. The text is brief. No deep history lessons, more of a broad overview of each decade. The pictures are wonderful though. So it's a good "look book". If you can't or don't collect antique photos to reference, this is a good alternative.
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For such a thin book it certainly is loaded with photographs something like 280 of them! The best part is there are plenty of men's styles included books of this sort tend to lean very heavily toward the women's fashions. As a male Civil War era living historian/re-enactor, I rely on original photos to help me perfect my impression. One cannot always count on the sutlers to sell accurate reproduction clothing and accessories. But, with a book like this, I was, for example, able to pick out the correct style of a bow tie needed for the era I portray. Something as simple as that shows how invaluable original sources like the pictures in this book can be.
Grouped by decade from the 1840's through the 1890's, this collection truly does cover the overall styles of the Victorian era. And there is a short blurb about each picture in this book to help the novice as well as the seasoned veteran along.
And the price is right, especially for the amount of photographs you receive.
(By the way, I wish the author would refrain from using the term "costume." It makes it sound like one goes to the costume shop to get their period clothing and clown make up. Believe me when I say that living historians/re-enactors do not purchase their period clothing from a costume shop)
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I'm a Theatre Costume Design student, and in theatre accuracy is key. When researching the fashion of a certain historical time period, ideally you want to be able to look at the physical garments worn at the time. However, unless you are lucky enough to have a huge museum or costume collection at your disposal, that's pretty much impossible.
Books like this, which feature collections of period photographs, are the next best thing. How can you doubt the reliability of the fashions depicted in a photograph when it was taken in the actual time period you're researching?
This book is an excellent resource and I highly recomment it to anyone interested in historical costumes.
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