This fascinating retrospective chronicles the rise and development of modern fashion illustration from the early 1900s to the dawn of the twenty-first century. Its lively narration, illustrated by over seventy original works by fashion's top illustrators, explores the social context of fashion illustration with feminine ideals that characterize each era: • The Temptress (1900–20) — Turn-of-the-century stage idols and screen vamps • The Garçonne (1920s) — The emancipated post–World War I woman • The Grown-Up and the Glamour Girl (1930s–40s) — Working girls and movie stars of the Great Depression and World War II • The Princess (1940s–50s) — Dior's New Look and the USA's postwar cultural dominance • Twiggies and Hippies (1960s–70s) — Protest and revolution, The Beatles, Twiggy, Warhol, psychedelics, flower children, and women's libbers • The Jetsetter (1980s–90s) — The Me Generation, the cult of fitness and perfection, supermodels and super career women • The Fashionista (1990s–2000s) — The massive influence of entertainers, sports figures, and the rich and famous • The Lady or the Tiger — Summarizes the Ideal's march through the century Professional fashion illustrator Rosemary Torre taught for three decades at New York City's Fashion Institute of Technology. Her original and authoritative survey features informative captions for each image and detailed biographies for every illustrator. Fashion-conscious women of all ages will treasure this captivating book, as will students and professional fashion and costume designers.

Drawing upon a vast number of historical sources, the authors of this useful reference have created an entertaining account of the forms of personal adornment men and women have used throughout the ages to enhance their wearing apparel. From hats, veils, wigs, and cosmetics, to cravats, shawls, shoes, and gloves, to walking sticks, handbags, fans, and furs, the engaging commentary displays the humor and personal charm of the many-sided story of accessorized apparel. 644 figures and 59 plates.

A classic in its field, this splendid guide to fashion history takes readers on a grand tour of the world, starting in ancient Egypt, circa 2200 B.C., and continuing on to the late nineteenth century. Handsome, accurately rendered illustrations depict a vast treasure trove of wearing apparel — furs, veils, ruffs, pointed bodices, and sashes abound, as do cloaks, leggings, waistcoats, breeches, military uniforms, and assorted head- and footwear. All levels of society are included in this thorough, panoramic display of past fashions — from peasants and the middle class to the nobility. Here is apparel that clothed inhabitants of Far East kingdoms, gladiators of the Roman Empire, Crusaders of the Middle Ages, Dutch citizens of the 1600s, and Parisian society in the late 1700s. More than 1,900 costumes are shown, including fashions from ancient Assyria, Babylonia, Persia, and Greece, as well as clothing from England, France, Germany, Turkey, Italy, and other European countries. An essential reference for costume designers and students of fashion history, this detailed survey will particularly delight the armchair time traveler.

In the 1920s, fashion magazines were the principal source for news of the latest Paris couture. One of the most famous and long-lived of these journals was L'Art et la Mode, published from 1880 to 1967. L'Art et la Mode captured the glamor that was Paris in the Twenties, from days at the races to nights at the opera, from Sundays at the Ritz to Saturdays at the Folies-Bergère, and it followed the glittering circuit that flourished from Longchamps to Deauville to Cannes to Biarritz. The magazine was read avidly not only by the rich who patronized the couture, but also by the woman who relied on her "little dressmaker" to copy the styles depicted in the periodical. This lavishly illustrated volume offers 138 dazzling pages from L'Art et la Mode featuring fashions for all occasions by the great French couturiers of the Twenties—Patou, Worth, Molyneux, Doucet, Paquin, Vionnet, Lanvin, and Chanel among them. Selected by JoAnne Olian, curator of the famed Costume Collection at the Museum of the City of New York, a wealth of designs include stylish outfits for winter sports, hunting season, tennis, golf, and other athletic pursuits, as well as high-fashion ensembles for soirées and all manner of chic divertissements. In addition to choosing the plates, Ms. Olian has also provided an excellent introduction discussing the magazine, the period, and its fashion trends. The result is a beautifully illustrated, sumptuous look back at one of haute couture's most influential decades. It is also an outstanding and inexpensive source of copyright-free fashion illustrations for use by designers and craftspeople.

Hard-to-find classic drew on primary sources — actual costumes, illuminated manuscripts, effigies, etc. — to provide authentic detailed coverage of what people wore in Britain from the early Saxon period (ca. A.D. 460) to the reign of King George III (1820). Clothing of commoners, royalty, and ecclesiastics. Indispensable for fashion historians.

This carefully researched volume offers lovers of both costume and the medieval period a meticulously researched and accurately detailed study of the clothing of the Middle Ages. Following an illuminating discussion of the style and construction of costumes worn in the thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth centuries, noted costume historian Mary G. Houston provides detailed descriptions and illustrations of actual apparel worn by all classes and sectors of society. Included are elaborate royal, academic, and legal costumes; Eucharistic vestments and garments of religious orders; working class apparel; civilian dress; and more. Also examined is a wide variety of accessories and ornaments, jewelry, armor, textiles, embroidery, coiffures, and other items. The clear, succinct text is splendidly documented by 350 black-and-white line illustrations based on contemporary books and manuscripts as well as representations in paintings and sculpture. Indispensable for students of costume history, medievalists, illustrators, and fashion historians, Medieval Costume in England and France will delight anyone interested in the medieval period and its dress.

Ever since Eve's first blush, clothes have girded, graced and transformed the female physique. Fascinating and insightful, The Corset and the Crinoline is an illustrated history of clothing's attendant underpinnings — especially those that whittled the female waist to its most slender proportions. Reproduced from a rare 1868 fashion publication, each page reveals how the use of wood, whalebone, steel, hoops, and tight laces had a gripping influence on shaping the figures of women from ancient Greece to nineteenth-century Vienna. Enlivened by excerpts from authentic letters, magazine articles, and satiric poems, over fifty exquisite black-and-white engravings highlight the wardrobes — and what was worn underneath them — of a Persian dancing girl, an ancient Egyptian woman, a Roman lady of high rank, Queen Elizabeth, Marie de Medici, a woman of the French revolutionary period, and many more. Costume designers, artists, and anyone interested in the history of fashion will be captivated!

A year after R. Turner Wilcox received rave reviews for her ultimate fashion reference, The Mode in Costume, she decided to zero in on one chic category to give it the close-up it deserved. The result is this extraordinary handbook that covers the worldwide evolution of almost five thousand years of hats, hairstyles, and headdress for both sexes. Since ancient times, men and women have used hats and headgear for everything from adornment and protection to establishing their rank in society. With hundreds of illustrations and fascinating text, this comprehensive survey extends from 3000 B.C. to mid-twentieth century. The showcase depicts an astonishing range of women's styles — Egyptian headdresses, Spanish mantillas, French straw sailor hats, buckle-trimmed tam-o-shanters, wedding veils, bonnets, snoods, and jeweled crowns. Men's headwear includes feather-trimmed turbans, soldiers' helmets, cowboy hats and top hats, derbies and boaters, berets, sombreros, and Homburgs. Hairstyles run the gamut as well: ringlets, topknots, and spit curls, ponytails, pageboys, and poodle cuts, as well as pompadours, mutton chops, and crew cuts. With delightful details on jewelry, cosmetics, and beauty treatments, this is a unique reference that fashion designers, stylists, and historians will treasure.

Superb illustrations from a rare source provide authentic views of evolving Victorian fashions — from high necklines, elongated bodices, and fitted bonnets to extravagant bustles. The meticulously reproduced plates include depictions of dresses, gowns, and coats as well as accessories. A must for costume designers, cultural historians, and fashion enthusiasts. Introduction. Captions.

While most of us would have little difficulty in recognizing a buckle, hem, or seam, we might be considerably more challenged if asked to identify a godet, a trilby, or a vamp. With this handy book at your fingertips, however, you can quickly find the definition of over 10,000 words associated with wearing apparel and fashion. From bateau necklines, bobs, and bustles to plackets, havelocks, and bavolets, terms are assembled alphabetically or in groups according to dress parts, fabrics, elements of design, and other style categories. In addition, over 950 clearly detailed illustrations depict stitches, weaves, laces, garments, collars, shoes, jewelry, hair styles, and other sartorial features. This is the perfect reference for increasing fashion vocabularies, injecting a stimulating term or phrase in conversations about wearing apparel, or making articles written about clothing more understandable. Fashion writers, costume designers, manufacturers, buyers, sales people — anyone interested in the history of fashion — will welcome this thorough and comprehensive guidebook. "Unique in its field and containing material not easily accessible elsewhere, it definitely has a place in the general reference library for quick identification purposes and for anyone concerned with the fashion field." — Booklist

"An attractive and informed guide. It includes an extensively cross-referenced list of films on which leading couturiers worked, a superb collection of stills, and a brief history of costume on the screen." — George L. George, Millimeter This handsome book, the first comprehensive reference work on costume design in films, is a remarkable tribute to the men and women who "dress" a film. Substantially revised and updated, it not only presents a splendid record of costume designers' contributions to cinema but also those of some of the world's great couturiers. The heart of the book is an illustrated listing, arranged alphabetically by designer, providing biographical and career data (screen credits, major awards and nominations) for every major American, British, and French designer who worked on American and British films between 1909 and 1987. Among the designers are such luminaries as Adrian, Travis Banton, Edith Head, Christian Dior, Orry-Kelly, Givenchy, Jean Louis, Howard Greer, Helen Rose, Norman Hartnell, Irene Sharaff, Walter Plunkett, Charles LeMaire, Tony Walton, and Ann Roth. Their creations are featured in over 170 photographs and design renderings reproduced on high-quality coated stock. Also included is an invaluable index containing titles of 6,000 films, cross-indexed by designer, along with over 400 new film credits covering the period 1976 – 1987. In addition, an Appendix lists Academy Award nominations from 1948 (when the design award was first established), as well as the names of those honored by the British Academy for Film and Television Arts. Essential reading for fashion and costume industry professionals, historians, and students, this superb sourcebook will be valued by countless moviegoers and the legions of film aficionados studying and working in motion pictures. "The author's stills are excellent, clearly identified, and often very enlightening." — Polly Platt, American Film

Late in the 18th century, English children's apparel began to look different from that worn by their elders. The reason, says writer James Laver in his introduction, is that someone finally realized children were different! This engaging book records those changes, with illustrations depicting styles at five- or ten-year intervals, from 1775 to 1920. 32 black-and-white illustrations.

Women's fashions of the 1920s continue to fascinate artists, couturiers, and students of fashion, who will welcome this treasury of French designs from that dazzling era. Carefully selected from rare issues of the famed French periodical La Vie Parisienne, over 630 royalty-free illustrations comprise a pictorial display of sophisticated couture embodying the seductive chic of the liberated woman. Drawn with wit, flair, and charm, the line cuts depict slinky beauties in an immense variety of gowns, dresses, coats, suits, beachwear, lounging suits, capes, and other outfits. Carefully reproduced, these stylish representations lend themselves perfectly to graphic projects calling for sophistication and feminine charm. Moreover, this inexpensive compilation presents a valuable and authentic record of French fashion from 1918 to 1928.

From headdresses to sandals, from warrior's armor to priestess's robes, the authentic costumes of people from all walks of life in the Roman and Greek civilizations are here pictured comprehensively and clearly. Three hundred finely drawn, detailed engravings (containing over 700 illustrations) show just what was worn by the poets, philosophers, priests and priestesses, peasants, Bacchanalians, emperors, generals, Amazons, and virgins of a bygone age. Carefully copied from ancient vases and statuary by Thomas Hope (1770–1831), a British collector and designer, these engravings combine an unusual clarity of style with unquestioned authenticity. Their range, too, is unusually great, for besides the many plates on the costumes of the Greeks and Romans, there are representative illustrations of the typical dress of such other civilizations as the Phrygian, Egyptian, Parthian, Etruscan, and Persian. In addition, scores of engravings are devoted to such now-forgotten objects as ancient musical instruments (the lyre, double flute, pipes of Pan, etc.), Bacchanalian implements, articles of furniture, women's trinkets and jewelry, sarcophagi, altars, and other adjuncts to ancient life. Such comprehensiveness makes this book indispensable to costume designers, stage fitters, and producers of classic plays, students of fashion design, and others interested in ancient costumes. The material included here is covered in no ordinary history, and only here can the interested reader discover just how the draping of the Greek robe was achieved, or what was worn at festivals and funerals by the various classes. Art directors, advertising managers, and others on the lookout for unusual and eye-catching illustrations will also treasure this collection. All of the engravings are royalty free and may be used in any way, whether as striking contrasts to modern styles in dress, jewelry, or furniture; for historical perspective; for mood pieces; or simply as unusual attention-getters.

Knights clad in chain mail populate these pages, alongside crowned heads in royal regalia and common folk in their finest apparel. Scrupulously authentic in every detail, these images offer colorful portraits that span centuries of fashion, from the Middle Ages through the Renaissance. Raphaël Jacquemin was preeminent among the fashion illustrators and historians of nineteenth-century Europe's golden age of fashion design publications. His 1869 Iconographie Générale et Méthodique du Costume du IV au XIX Siècle drew upon manuscripts, reliefs, and effigies from the Louvre, university libraries, and other archives for the most striking and accurate fashion statements from the fourth through seventeenth centuries. This collection features ninety of Jacquemin's magnificent hand-colored engravings, a gallery of iconic portraits that have served as museum exhibits in their own right. Fashion designers, artists, costumers, and others seeking authenticity of period detail—as well as inspiration for contemporary styles—will find this book a splendid resource.

At the turn of the century, ladies of privilege could easily afford their own dressmakers, and even middle-class housewives occasionally employed competent seamstresses. But many women did their own sewing, often relying on Dressmaking, Up to Date, a how-to book published by the Butterick Publishing Company. First published in 1905 and widely considered the first modern American sewing book, this extremely rare volume is published here complete and unabridged. This Butterick manual provides clear and concise instructions for altering patterns, hand-sewing stitches, and creating shirt-blouses, skirts, wedding and evening gowns, coats, jackets, maternity wear, undergarments, bathrobes, children's clothing, and many other articles of apparel. Today's costume historians and sewing enthusiasts will find fascinating instruction in such long-lost arts as boning a bodice perfectly, creating skirt sweepers and bust enhancers, concealing hooks and eyes, and other vintage dressmaking techniques. An indispensable archive of information on late-Victorian and turn-of-the-century clothing, this volume will be of immense interest to anyone fascinated by the fashion and costume of the period. It will also be of value to needleworkers wanting to create accurate reproductions of Victorian-era costume, or to anyone interested in applying time-honored sewing techniques to a modern wardrobe.

As an early-twentieth-century English artist with an interest in historical subjects, Talbot Hughes began collecting clothing for accuracy in his paintings—and the pursuit grew into a labor of love. His magnificent costume collection was eventually displayed in Harrod's and has become a permanent part of the collection of the venerable Victoria and Albert Museum in London. In this well-researched guide, Hughes traces the evolution of English fashions from the grass-cloth wraps of prehistoric times to the luxurious gowns of the Victorian era. Arranged chronologically and by British reigns, this splendid compilation includes over 300 illustrations of period fashions for men and women and 94 photos of historic garments. Pictured are tunics and tights from the thirteenth century, Elizabethan gowns with starched ruff collars, Charles I cavaliers with lace-collared jackets and breeches, a five-century array of boots and shoes, an assortment of elaborate wigs, embroidered waistcoats, quilted petticoats, plumed headdresses, and other dashing designs of the past. More than a history of British style, it's also a dressmaker's delight, with scaled-down patterns for 67 authentic costumes—and a perfect reference for fashion designers, stylists, and historians.

Clothing was hardly a practical necessity in North Africa and what is today the Middle East. Often a luxury item in these warm, humid climates, it became more essential as people's lives improved socially and economically. But even then, the drapery was light and tended to accent the body's shape rather than conceal it. The first part of this profusely illustrated and scrupulously researched text examines the evolution in apparel worn by Egyptian royalty, priests, musicians, manual workers, the military, and foreigners (as depicted by Egyptian artists). Two additional sections consider clothing worn in ancient Mesopotamia and Persia, focusing largely on Sumerian, Babylonian, and Assyrian styles. Over 250 illustrations, drawn in the artistic style of the period, are accompanied by flat patterns showing the cut of the garment, thus enabling today's costumers to accurately reconstruct this apparel. A comprehensive archive that will not only be of immense value to fashion historians and students of costume design, this volume will also fascinate anyone interested in the development of artistic representation.

Over 400 illustrations in this superb pictorial archive trace the evolution of clothing styles, armor, and weapons during the medieval period in Central Europe. Unsurpassed in its comprehensiveness and variety, the volume draws upon a wealth of authentic primary sources, including written accounts, contemporary paintings and sculpture, and the remains of textiles and other relics. A profusion of apparel and weaponry are depicted, ranging from the simple tunics and robes of peasants, blacksmiths, gardeners, shoemakers, fishermen, and other common laborers to the fur-lined cloaks and brocaded garments of the aristocracy. Tools and utensils used by peasants as well as the battle equipment and armor of warriors are also pictured and described, with special emphasis on how these weapons were handled, carried, and used in combat. Accompanied by a scrupulously researched and well-documented text, these royalty-free illustrations not only offer general readers an intriguing and authentic insight into a past age but also provide artists, historians, students of weaponry, and theater and film professionals with a highly accurate source of reference material.

Corsets in one form or another have existed since biblical times. By the 19th century, they were so firmly entrenched in feminine life that it seemed impossible to live without them. These foundation garments altered more than the figure — their restrictions affected the wearer's behavior as well as impressions of her character. Until they were supplanted by diet and exercise, corsets offered the customary means of obtaining the currently popular shape: the rigidly flat torso and raised bosom of the seventeenth century; the eighteenth century's shoulders-back, flat-stomached, high-busted look; or the hourglass figure of the 19th century. This revealing history of corsetry ranges from the 19th through the mid-20th centuries, showing how simple laced bodices developed into corsets of cane, whalebone, and steel — many of them painfully constricting. Abundant illustrations include line drawings, photographs, and patterns from a diversity of sources, such as clothing catalogs, newspaper advertisements, and magazine articles. Costumers, designers, and fashion historians will find this volume a valuable source of information and inspiration.

This fine reproduction of a 1929 French fashion catalog features styles for all occasions. More than 50 color illustrations showcase elegant dresses, gowns, and coats from the designers of an influential and internationally renowned studio. Designs include a promenade and party frocks of silk, lace, and taffeta, all in the era's distinctive dropped-waist, knee-length mode, forming a panorama of fashions favored by flappers, society matrons, and other women of the 1920s. A rare source of authentic period styles, this volume will prove an excellent guide for designers, costume historians, and collectors of vintage apparel. Color images of Jazz Age fashions are few and far between, and these full-page illustrations offer clear views of trimmings, seaming, and other details. Notes on each model include information about the costume's intended season and occasion, fabrics, and accessories.

Thousands of terms associated with apparel worn in the principal countries of Europe appear in this extensive and convenient reference. The alphabetically arranged items of clothing span nearly 2,000 years of fashion history — from the onset of the Christian era in the first century to the beginning of the reign of George III, c. 1760. From abacot, hacketon, helm, jipocoat, and jump to xainture, ysgyn, zatayn, and zibelline, the sweeping scope of this volume encompasses a remarkable range of all-but-forgotten lore. Profusely illustrated with over 1,300 detailed line drawings, it offers a useful guide for fashion and cultural historians, writers, designers, movie and theatrical producers, and all others with an interest in the history of fashion.

The nineteenth century was a period of continuous change for women's clothing in England. The growing prosperity of the merchant class meant an ever-larger number of women for whom "dress" was a principal function in life, while the increasing availability of lower-priced ready-made garments enabled women of moderate means to purchase the fashions of the day. In addition, the development of the railways spurred the spread of new goods, while the removal of the tax on papers in 1854 produced an abundance of fashion magazines at cheap prices, bringing news of the latest styles to the multitudes. The magnificent array of ladies' fashions that characterized the century are on display in this remarkably complete decade-by-decade overview. Drawing almost exclusively on contemporary sources — fashion magazines, newspapers, rare period photographs, memoirs, Victorian novels, periodicals, and other publications, as well as firsthand observation of actual garments — the author describes and explains the couture that evolved in response to changing social conditions, technological innovations, and cultural developments. Over 1,100 line and tone drawings and photographs depict hundreds of outfits ranging from lovely morning dresses and starkly attractive riding outfits to elegant carriage costumes, opulent evening dresses, and exquisite bridal gowns. Full-page plates also depict period millinery, footwear, underclothing, and other apparel, while three useful glossaries provide descriptions of materials, definitions of technical terms, and more. Museum curators, vintage clothes collectors, and fashion historians will find this carefully researched and well-written book an indispensable tool for dating, identifying, and authenticating vintage clothing. Not only are styles described and illustrated in detail for each year; all the small details of construction by which specimens can be dated are given wherever possible. Moreover, designers, illustrators, and fashion enthusiasts will be delighted by the superbly detailed illustrations, which painstakingly document the fashionable finery of the Victorian era.

Since the invention of photography there has not been a history of fashion completely illustrated by photographs — until this one. Photography historian Alison Gernsheim first studied Victorian and Edwardian fashion in order to be able to date photographs in her collection. Of course the photos soon proved to be the best of all fashion plates — authentic, detailed, as decorative and charming as top fashion illustration. When united with identifications and descriptions of the chief costume articles, and a commentary that includes childhood memories of the period, the resulting history is doubly indispensable — equally useful and delightful to serious and casual readers. The invention of photography preceded that of the crinoline by about a decade. Pre-crinoline bonnets, stovepipe hats, and deep décolletage are featured in the first of these 235 illustrations — including a beautiful 1840 daguerreotype portrait of a lady that is the earliest study of its kind extant. From 1855 to the 1870s the crinoline gave shape (whether barrel, bell, teapot, or otherwise) to English women, and their shapes fill many of these full and half-page photos. English men went beardless in top hats and frock coats; as in other eras, the sporting wear of the previous generation became acceptable morning and evening town attire. Styles and accoutrements came and went — moustaches, straw hats, bustles and bodice line, petticoats, corsets, shawls and falsies, flounces, ruffles, lace, and materials — satin, silk, velvet, woolen underwear, full-length sable, and osprey feathers. Many of the models for these fashions were already fashionable enough — Oscar Wilde, Aubrey Beardsley, Lillie Langtry, Winston Churchill, many archdukes, duchesses, counts, princes, and Queen Victoria herself. Photographers are identified where possible, and include Nadar, Lewis Carroll, and the Downeys. Every photograph is captioned and annotated.

Compelling pictorial archive of 264 vintage photographs, selected from rare tintypes and other authentic materials (1850s–1910), depict little girls in their mothers' hats and clothes, sisters wearing identical plaid dresses and button boots, a young man in an everyday suit and bowler hat, a boy dressed in Little Lord Fauntleroy style, and scores of others.

This scrupulously researched, meticulously rendered collection spotlights multiple generations of a family for each decade of the twentieth century. Apparel includes everything from ankle-length tennis outfits and men's formal wear of the 1910s to military outfits from both World Wars, high-fashion suits and dresses in the post WWI years, and wedding finery spanning several decades. These immediately useable illustrations have a host of applications for fashion and costume designers, fashion historians, and anyone looking for fashion images to use in art and craft projects. Informative notes on the costumes complete an outstanding collection documenting nearly 100 years of costume history.

This magnificent fashion history is a stylistic panorama that ranges from the Norman conquest to the early 19th century, focusing chiefly on armor, from the Crusades to the 17th century; clothing of the English upper classes, both sexes, 11th to 19th centuries; and accessories, including gloves, belts, corsets, shoes, and headgear. 342 black-and-white illustrations.

A unique fashion image developed in mid nineteenth-century America reflecting the influences of Queen Victoria, the court of Napoleon III and American adaptions of European designs, many of the stylish silhouettes that emerged from this spirited era are still admired today. This book presents a fashion parade of authentic ladies' and childrens' styles from the most influential women's magazine of the period — Godey's Lady's Book — which presented both original fashions and adaptations from European publications. Over 400 striking designs, including 42 figures in full color, were chosen for this volume from a selection of rare issues (1837–1869) of Godey's by Stella Blum, director of Kent State University Museum and former curator of the Costume Institute at New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art. Among the many beautiful illustrations reproduced here are morning dresses, walking suits, riding outfits, ball gowns, capes, children's costumes, plus hairstyles and a full array of accessories — shoes, bonnets, gloves, muffs, fans, walking sticks, and more. Captions detail the rich fabrics, color schemes, and decorative trims of this gallery of vintage attire. The illustrations offer a panoramic view of evolving styles from Victorian 1940s outfits with severe high necklines, elongated bodices, and bonnets designed to keep the wearer's eyes looking chastely ahead; to 1950's adaptations of French haute couture featuring ornate gowns widened with hoopskirts and elaborately trimmed with lace, ribbons, fringes, and feathers; to 1860's garb in which skirts narrowed and graceful trains replaced the hoopskirt. Costume and culture historians, clothing designers and illustrators will find the work a valuable reference to clothing designs of the period and a fascinating look back at mid-Victorian couture.

Scrupulously researched book by noted authority traces the development of European clothing styles from prehistory to the Norman Conquest in A.D. 1066. Over 160 illustrations, including 17 full-color plates, display draped robes of classical Greece, the jewel-encrusted apparel of a 10th-century Byzantine emperor, garments of peasants, as well as footwear, hairstyles, headdresses, and jewelry.

From 1861 to 1890 the Munich publishing firm of Braun & Schneider published plates of historic and contemporary costume in their magazine Münchener Bilderbogen. These plates were eventually collected in book form and published at the turn of the century in Germany and England. This volume presents all 125 double-spread plates from the third English edition. For the first time, the plates appear in chronological order and with English captions. Over 1,450 costumed figures are shown, from antiquity to the end of the nineteenth century, covering a wide variety of social classes, and professions: Egyptian and Assyrian kings, Byzantine emperors, Frankish and Norman nobles, priests, servants, soldiers of many lands and eras, crusaders, German knights, pages, Italian scholars, German townspeople, peasants, merchants, Dutch burghers, popes, nuns, bishops, monks, English Puritans and Cavaliers, English and French kings, Swiss citizens, French courtiers and republicans, and many more. In addition, there is excellent coverage of late-nineteenth-century folk and their costumes, captured just before the beginning of standard Western dress — Italian, Spanish, Dutch, French, German, Russian, Eastern European, Chinese, Japanese, Asian, and others. To avoid the variable and somewhat fanciful depictions of color in the early editions, all costumes are rendered in black-and-white. A comprehensive source of historic costume in pictures, this remarkable book will be invaluable to costume designers, students of fashion design, commercial artists, and anyone interested in the history of dress. The illustrations are uniformly excellent, and the exceptionally low price makes this book even more attractive.