#19th c menswear

[sarahthecoat]

always rb good costume pix! LOVE the double waistcoat style of this era.

and again, note how every detail in the two designs, emphasizes and exaggerates. crowley is made taller and slimmer, aziraphale is made bulkier, wider, less tall. <3

Crowley and Aziraphale in a graveyard in 1827 Edinburgh - Good Omens Season 2, episode 3

for Tennant Tuesday (or whatever day this post finds you)

[elijah-loyal]

y'all i just found my 1830s waistcoat drafting sheets and mock-up pattern in the moving boxes from MONTHS ago

[david-watts]

since I'm only watching the serials that I really want to I've skipped ahead to mark of the rani and I must ask. what in the everloving hell is peri wearing

[vinceaddams]

Top 5 historic clothing items we should bring back into style (stockings on men, big cuffs on coats etc.)

Well I am very biased, because my everyday clothes are mostly 18th century menswear inspired, but for a list as short as 5 it's good to narrow it down!

1. 18th century shirts. Big puffy soft linen shirts. Best shirts. Comfiest shirts. Though tragically, since they get softer with more washing, they're at their absolute most comfortable right before they wear out.

(This one's from the post where I copied the tiddy-out violinist painting.) Besides being the nicest softest comfiest, they're also the most economical, being made entirely from rectangles. And they're versatile, they look good with lots of different garments! Someday I will do a very detailed youtube tutorial for my machine sewn shirt method. I've done so many now that I think I've finally got it down.

2. Adjustable waistbands. Why did this ever stop being a thing? 18th century breeches have lacing at the back, then in the 19th century trousers have a buckle tab. Now they do not, even though we're all still humans with bodies that change. (These are my orange silk breeches)

Do you know how many hours of my life I've spent taking in or letting out the waist seams of modern trousers? I don't know either, but I've been an alterations tailor since 2019, so it's got to be a fair amount.

All that waist altering wouldn't be necessary if they still made them adjustable! Waistlines fluctuate, so too should waistbands!!

3. Shoulder capes attached to coats. This was a thing in the late 18th century, and in the 19th, and I think into the early 20th too. It adds extra protection from the rain and snow, and it looks cool.

(c. 1812, The Met.)

(c. 1840-60, MFA Boston. The cape on this one is detachable)

You can make them long or short, and stack them up like pancakes or just have one. I've got 2 small ones on my corduroy coat, and one on my dark blue wool. Both cut from almost the same 1790's-ish pattern.

I also want to give a shoutout to fitted sleeves! I love me some two piece sleeves with a distinct elbow! And the coat pockets were bigger back then.

4. Indoor caps. I don't care what era or how fancy you go with it, I just want people to wear caps indoors when it's cold! This one's super simple, it's just a tube of linen tied with a ribbon.

(Detail from Le Marchand d’Orviétan ou l’opérateur Barri by Etienne Jeaurat, 1743.)

If it's cold in your apartment you need slippers for the feets and a cap for the head. Speaking of which.

5. Medieval hoods. This one is wayyy outside my usual era, but the wintery below-freezing weather has just started here and the knit hat I've been wearing isn't quite long enough to cover my ears. I want to make a simple hat with ear flaps, but I also wouldn't be opposed to trying to work something vaguely similar to this into my wardrobe. It looks so warm!

(Image source. Also she has a printable pattern available!) I actually made one of these once, an entire decade ago. But it was scratchy blanket wool and I've since given it away.

That's some of the main things I think we should bring back! There are lots of other things too, like men's nightgowns, and waistcoats with little scenes embroidered on them, but for this list I tried to be mostly practical.

[titleleaf]

so many words about historical men's corsetry

(This got way too long to send via Discord -- Dangimace in the Renegade Bindery server asked about men's corset sewing/resource recs so here is my half-assed and non-exhaustive rundown. Most of my historical sewing is focused on fashions of the UK, US, and Europe for the second half of the 18th century and first half of the 19th century, so that bias is reflected here; also disclaimer overall that "menswear"/"womenswear" are socially constructed categories and real people's bodies have always looked a wider variety of ways than fashion and other social forces would dictate. I sew historical garments with enthusiastic disregard for the historical gender binary and I'm barrel-chested, thick-waisted, and narrow-hipped no matter what I'm wearing.)

Onward, lads!

Ok wrt men's corsetry: there's a whole lot of fogginess around how historical men's corsets were constructed for a bunch of annoying reasons but that means there's lots of possibilities to explore in pattern drafting and project planning. Stays and other stiffened body-shaping garments have a whole complex conceptual relationship to the body basically as soon as they start appearing. 16th and 17th century garments do a whole lot of shaping (both compressing and building up) for men and women alike, but things really kick off in the 18th century in terms of the symbolic weight placed on stays and (later) corsets. Whole lot of stuff about gender, social class, race, fatness, morality, etc. getting projected onto these garments. So I'm a little leery about people taking obviously satirical illustrations of fashion-victim dandies or Gross Corpulent Libertines getting laced into corsets as truthful and indicative of the way men were really dressing -- scurrilous gossip and exaggeration are both a pain to sift through if we want to know which men wore corsets, what kind, and why.

In the very late 18th/early 19th century corsets were part of the repertoire for achieving highly fashionable shapes in menswear. (Along with a whole lot of padding.) They weren't mandatory for all dudes, but for fashion-forward dandies and equally fashion-forward military men, male corsets/stays were definitely a thing. The whole Romantic-era pigeon-breasted, narrow-waisted silhouette can be emulated by shapewear worn beneath the clothes, pads in the garments themselves, or both; in addition to waist reduction it helped to maintain smooth visual lines underneath close-fitting garments.

(look at these minxy 1830s dudes and their tiny waists)

As the century goes on the desired menswear silhouette becomes boxier and less fitted, and male corsetry recedes into the background; we start to see patents and advertisements for men's corsetry, so they still seem to have been worn, but there's a lot more language around vigorous manly athleticism and supporting the structures of the body. It can be hard to tell whether a particular piece is intended to be worn primarily for some medical purpose or for its perceived aesthetic benefits. This is giving me such flashbacks to trying to find post-surgical compression garments.

(Side note: there's also a vigorous tradition of fetishist writing about corsetry all through the 19th century, in fairly mainstream channels, which is fascinating. Due to the relatively private and deeply horny nature of fetish tightlacing we don't necessarily know as much about what those same letter-writers may have "really" worn at home, but I hope they were having fun.)

I've seen very few specifically men's corsetry patterns from historical pattern-makers-- not even really big names like Redthreaded. I sewed my 19thc menswear corsets from the men's underbust pattern in Laughing Moon Mercantile #113 which afaik is speculative rather than reproducing a specific historical garment, but it's not too different from the women's late-19th-century underbust patterns in the same pattern pack.

(image credit: LMM)

However, a lot of underbust and waist-cincher patterns from more general historical patternmakers could be made suitable with some minor alterations. Here I'd also rec books like Jill Salen's Corsets: Historical Patterns And Techniques and Norah Waugh's Corsets & Crinolines, though their focus is definitely on womenswear and you need to be relatively comfortable scaling up or drafting from pattern diagrams.

The structural features and desired results for a man's corset are pretty much the same as any other corset (back support, compression in some areas, etc.) even when the desired silhouette is different; commercially-created patterns are drafted with the expectation of certain bodily proportions so like with all corset-sewing it's important to make a mockup for fitting purposes. (I ended up liking one of my mockups so much I finished the process and made it a whole separate corset.) I don't know much about this area but I seem to see a lot more belt-and-buckle closures and criss-crossing straps in corsets designated as being for men -- this might be a byproduct of gendered differences in how people got dressed, but it might be nothing.

There's some weird and wonderful historical examples, both extant and in images -- I appreciated this post at Matsuzake Sewing, "A Brief Discussion Of Men's Stays", and its accompanying roundup of images on Pinterest though the tone wrt historical fetishwear corsets in the blog post is a little snippy. I really want to make a replica of Thomas Chew's 1810s corset (which you can read more about here at the USS Constitution Museum) but it incorporates stretch panels made with a shitload of metal springs and I'm not ready for all the trial and error trying to replicate that.

(image credit: USS Constitution Museum Collections)

There's a pretty rich vein of modern men's corset patterns which seem like they could be easily pattern-hacked for historical costuming purposes, like these with shoulder straps from Corsets By Caroline or DrobeStoreUpcycling's waist cincher which also looks like it could be altered pretty easily to cinch with straps and buckles like some 19thc men's corsetry does. This pattern for a boned chest binder in vest form by KennaSewLastCentury is also really cool but I didn't get a chance to sew it pre-top-surgery. (I think I've also seen someone who made a chest-compressing variation on Regency short stays, but I can't find it now.) 

In general a lot of underbust and waist-cincher patterns should work just fine for silhouette-shaping without much bust/hip emphasis -- my usual resource for free corset patterns (Aranea Black) recently took down all her free patterns but they're definitely still circulating out there. For general fashion purposes the sky is the limit and there are a lot of enthusiastic dudes in corsets out there. This Lucy Corsetry round-up shows a variety of modern corsetiers'  styles designated as being for men or more masculine silhouettes (including a SUPER aspirational brocaded corset with matching waistcoat made by Heavenly Corsets that I'd love to sew a historical spin on) and you can see some commonalities and possibilities for body-shaping.

I can also give some more general corset-sewing resources but I'm very much in the learning process here and I'd love any recs or input from people more experienced in pattern-drafting and corset-sewing.

[clove-pinks]

Fashion History Books on Internet Archive

Illustration in La Mode by Paul Gavarni, c. 1835 (Rijksmuseum)

A selection of some of my favourites, free to read and check out once you create a (free) account!

Handbook of English Costume in the 19th Century, by C. Willett Cunnington and Phillis Cunnington. I can vouch for this as one of the greatest books in my collection, extensive menswear information. By the same authors: English costume in the Eighteenth, Seventeenth, and Sixteenth centuries.

A History of Men’s Fashion, by Farid Chenoune. A masterwork, absolute must-read primer on men’s fashion from the late 18th century to the late 20th century.

The Encyclopedia of World Costume by Doreen Yarwood. Covers many different cultures over a huge span of time so most topics are not treated in-depth, but still a great reference.

The History of Underclothes, by C. Willett Cunnington and Phillis Cunnington. Also covers men’s shirts in Western dress history, as these were considered undergarments.

Fashioning the Body: An Intimate History of the Silhouette, edited by Denis Bruna. A collection of essays on changing dress silhouettes in Western fashion over time, some of them very insightful. 

The Dictionary of Fashion History, by Valerie Cumming. This is the first edition and I have the second, but my top fashion history dictionary and go-to for textiles and items of dress!

[gothhabiba]

hello! i am a longtime huge admirer of your clothing/fashion sense, as well as a longtime backreader of your #victorian and #goth tags. i am really interested in what you've written about Victorian dress, and i am looking to get more into 19th and 20th century clothing for gender + diy craft reasons. i'm so sorry if you've answered similar questions before, but do you have any tips for where a newbie should start researching? either way, thank you thank you, your blog opens my mind wide and brings me much joy and reflection!

General research:

Spend some time searching the 'net, museum websites, and archive sites for fashion plates (such as archive.org—link leads to a date-restricted query for "fashion"—or the Smithsonian—link leads to fashion plates in their image collection). Take note of what you like, as well as which styles correspond to which decade. Karolina Żebrowska has a good rundown of English fashion over the decades.

The undergarments are what does the most work creating the necessary silhouette to make Victorian & Edwardian womenswear fit properly. If you've figured out a decade you want your outfit to draw on, doing a quick search for "[decade] undergarments" should bring up plenty of blog posts, which may or may not cite primary sources (such is the fickle nature of the historical blogosphere). Bustle pads and sleeve supports can be purchased or made; they're both pretty simple, and tutorials abound.

Purchasing clothing:

Reproduction made-to-measure clothing can be readily found on etsy, but can be in the several-hundred USD range. I've had some luck finding vintage reproduction clothing (like, a skirt someone made by hand in the 1980s to a 1900s walking skirt pattern), which tends to be much cheaper.

Men, women, and children wore stays and corsets. As far as I know, Orchard Corset has the cheapest OTR corsets that are good quality and safe to wear. If you get a corset in the style of a specific decade handmade or made to measure, make sure that the seller tells you what the boning material is, what construction the boning is (spiral steel is sturdiest and most flexible), how many bones there are, what the corset material is, &c.—otherwise it's an indication of an unserious maker. Follow general advice for wearing corsets at a waist reduction (lace up slowly, break it in, &c.).

Antique Menswear on youtube gives a lot of good, practical advice for wearing late 19th-century and early 20th-century men's clothing (including where to buy reproductions and how to treat them, how to modify modern shirts to 19th-century standards with basically no sewing skills, &c.).

Actual antique clothing can be found and purchased online or at estate sales—usually in very small sizes, but I've seen Edwardian skirts and petticoats in an XL (also a small size, but...). You can also just simply browse this kind of thing for inspiration and save photos of anything you think you'd like to recreate.

Even clothing that was not "meant" to be worn by re-enactors can be clearly historically influenced (e.g. the huge boom in Victorian- and Edwardian- style blouses in the 1980s), so keep an open mind when shopping for vintage clothing! A lot of 1970s dresses that look "hippy" on their own can look very Victorian with the right undergarments and an updo. A lot of 1980s men's trousers also approach the right silhouette for the 1910s-inspired three-piece suit I'm trying to put together. Witness also the recent trend for big puffed sleeves!

Making or modifying clothing:

Victorian and Edwardian manuals for garment drafting and sewing can be found online—go to archive.org and search for "sewing," "drafting," or "dressmaking," then use the filters on the left to chuse which year(s) you want to see results from. Most of these have patterns that are sort of vibes-based: The work-woman's guide is one manual that claims to have patterns laid out strictly according to a grid.

I don't sew garments, but if Victorian pattern-writing for sewing is anything like it is for knitting, that may not be super useful. People do sell updates and graded 'translations' of antique patterns (which tend to be written in only one size) on etsy and ebay—just make sure from the description that it's 'deciphered' and translated rather than a scan of the original pattern!

One of the easiest things that you can do to add some Victorian or Goth flair to an otherwise plain-looking garment is to add trim. You can knit, crochet, or tat your own trim from Victorian lace-making patterns; purchase antique trim from resale sites; or buy braided or lace trim very cheaply at any craft store. Trim doesn't just have to go around the hems and cuffs of a garment: lace "insertions" between two pieces of fabric, as well as raised geometric patterns over the surface of a garment, are common in 19th-century clothing.

[ID: first image shows a black overdress showing lace insertions between strips of fabric of equal width, creating a striped effect. second image is the back of a black blouse with trim in a geometric design centred around right angles and parallel lines. end ID]

Jewellery (women's and men's):

Actual antique jewellery (including men's jewellery and fastenings) is not as expensive as you might think. Even if you're not willing to spend a lot of time learning what to look for and scouring estate sales for people who don't know or care what they have, late Victorian mass-manufactured costume jewellery often goes for sub-$50 or even $30 prices at auction on ebay (USD, in the US—in my experience it is even more plentiful and cheaper in the UK).

Specifically, I've lucked out with lots ("lot" as in, a bunch of small things being sold together) of "vintage men's accessories" going for $20 or so that contained Victorian cufflinks (in low-karat gold, mother-of-pearl, and jet), collar studs (in low-karat gold and base metals), and shirt studs (in low-karat gold, with garnets and seed pearls, &c.). Searching for lots of accessories is generally a good idea since by and large people do not know what these things are... but if you're willing to spend a little more for something that has been identified and is more likely to still be with its set, use the specific search term for that item (e.g. "antique collar studs").

Answers to Questions About Old Jewelry (though aimed at estate sellers and, if memory serves, full of regrettable pæans to Queen Victoria) is a good reference text to dating antique jewellery. I also recommend Miller's Illustrated Guide to Jewelry Appraising. Both of these texts are available on libgen.

Feel free to ask me follow-up questions if you want more detail on any of these points. As you can see I am perfectly happy to blather away on this topic

[assessthatdress]

his robe is actually printed not embroidered! historically, fabric like this would have been hand-printed with a series of complex, interlocking carved wooden blocks like this:

this is actually better than embroidered given the goal of costuming as 'communicating a lot of info about a character without exposition'. Banyan robes like this would have been worn as fashionable 'undress' at home by gentlemen - so not really appropriate to be traipsing around doing naturalist things. But, from this production's standpoint it is serving to show Maturin as softer, more 'natural' and more casual in contrast to the more stiff/traditional naval characters.

by the early 19th c. embroidery was already largely relegated to formal wear for men, until it basically disappeared from menswear almost entirely later in the century (aside from occasional exceptions like livery or a subtle design on a waistcoat or an emblem or something).

Cottons printed in India - like chintz and calico (both words derive from Hindi) - and later, fabrics printed in Europe which basically copied Indian design & aesthetics wholesale, were very popular for more informal clothing in the west starting in the later part of the 18th century. Here's a dress with a quite similar pattern from a similar period:

The wiki lists banyans as being inspired by kimono, but considering the relatively limited exposure the west had to Japanese material goods prior to the mid 19th c. and the fact that 'banyan' has sanskrit origins, I think it's far more likely that the style of garment was inspired by the many open-robe style overgarments worn throughout the near east and through southeast Asia.

Many banyans were imported garments with minimal modification, (or even could be made directly for export to the European market - a similar thing happened in the late 19th century with Western women snapping up and wearing kimono as dishabille at the height of late 19th c. Japonisme)

I want to live my hot girl summer like I’m stephen maturin in the galapagos- just a straw hat, a sexy embroidered robe, some lizards, and vibes

[fixaidea]

Me staring at my frilly shirts: it's not feminine, it's the fashion of an 18th century GENTLEMAN.

[fashionsfromhistory]

Denim Jacket

c.1850

United States

​This jacket would have been worn over a woman’s work dress or blouse, most likely while she labored outdoors. Its construction mimics the fashionable hourglass silhouette of the period, with tucks that cinch at the wrists and natural waistline. Denim is typically thought of as a menswear textile, but it was also common in women’s workwear during the 19th century.

Museum at FIT (Object number: P87.43.3)

[marzipanandminutiae]

I am summoned!

Karen Memory series (two books so far)- 17-year-old Karen is a voluntary sex worker in alternate-universe steampunk Seattle c. 1879. She also happens to be gay. When a vigilante rescues a young girl named Priya who's been trafficked to a dockside crib and brings her to shelter in Karen's brothel, Karen and her friends get more than they bargained for from the trafficker and his cronies- and uncover a deeper, more evil plot than they'd imagined. And Karen herself falls in love in the bargain.

One thing I love about this series is that it understands just how complex and non-homogenous the 19th century American west was, racially and in the presence of queer people. Famed real-life Black US marshal Bass Reeves shows up with a Comanche deputy, there are multiple characters of color among Karen's cohort, the love interest is an Indian engineering genius, the madam of the brothel is (secretly) biracial and powerful in the local community, one of Karen's friends is a trans woman and that's never remarked upon at length...it's not an imagined version of the past where everyone is cishet and white, but ALSO not a perfect utopia that doesn't address bigotry at all.

Even though the MC is technically a teenager, I don't consider this one YA because she's effectively an adult by the standards of her society and acting in that social role.

A Sweet Sting of Salt- 1830s Nova Scotia. Young midwife Jean gets the shock of her life when she finds a woman laboring in the marsh outside her cottage in the middle of the night. The delivery goes smoothly, and Jean soon learns that the woman- Muirin -is her fisherman neighbor's new wife. However, as weeks pass and their bond begins to deepen, Jean realizes that something is very wrong with the marriage- and resolves to set Muirin free.

Lesbian 19th century selkie story. I mean. How can you go wrong?

Carmilla- Does this one even need an introduction? THE seminal lesbian vampire tale. Published in 1871-72 but set in the 1820s, this classic follows the memories of a woman named Laura as she recalls a strange, lovely guest who stayed with her when she was 19 and the dark misadventure that followed.

...it's Carmilla. End of. Read Carmilla Please.

Romancing the Inventor- Technically part of a series, but it's a standalone tie-in novel, so you can read it on its own if you're cool with a bit of In Media Res worldbuilding (I don't think it's too hard to follow!). In which a sapphic country lass- with hidden mathematical talents -hires herself as a maid to a house of vampires, desperately hoping to attract the attention of their Queen...and falls hard for the resident lady inventor instead.

This and Karen Memory are like "oh yeah I usually prefer femme4femme stories" "what if the butch is wearing HISTORICAL menswear?" "you have my attention"

Seconding Fingersmith. Fingersmith Very Good.

Watch Crimson Peak and read Edith/Lucille fanfiction. It's only subtext- intentional subtext on at least one actor's part -in the movie, but the fanfic is. Excellent.

The Haunting of Heatherhurst Hall claims to be Crimson Peak But Gay And No Incest (oops spoilers). It is that- to the point where, since I adore CPeak, it's just too much like my Thing without being my Thing. Also the MC is an anti-Sue, meaning the author can't go five seconds without mentioning how Awkward and Clumsy and Graceless and Inelegant and Weird every. single. aspect of her is. this gets old fast.

Absolutely WILD question but for some reason I feel like you'd be the person to have good answers??? I need more actually good wlw story recs, books preferred but I'd accept shows and movies! Rec even the most obvious things, I truly have lived under a rock I know tlt and Baru Cormorant and not much else ;-; thank you!!

Not a wild question at all! Sarah Waters is great (Fingersmith especially), if you're not watching Yellowjackets yet you should be, I've heard very good things about something called Our Wives under the Sea but haven't read it yet myself, and if you're interested in nonfiction there's a ton of somewhat-dated-but-otherwise-very-good narrative history work from someone called Lillian Faderman. If you're okay with subtext there's also most of Shirley Jackson's novels and, for similar wlw Catholic vibes to TLT, the opera Dialogues of the Carmelites. (That one is by a gay male composer, Francis Poulenc, and is known to have been That Way on purpose.) Jawbone by Monica Ojeda is very very good, but one of the darkest and most upsetting books I've ever read. If you like Baru Cormorant you should be able to handle it, though.

Oh and there's always Carmilla, especially the original novella but also the significantly better-known mid-2010s webseries.

Summoning @staghunters, @vickythestrange, @marzipanandminutiae, @carys-the-ninth, @rebeccadumaurier,

@sapphicscience, @eucatastrophicblues, @mayasaura, and @maryblackwood for more recs if they have some.

[soliyra-the-sunbringer]

Mary Bonnet’s Futuristic Fashions

[reposting because this probably deserves its own post] There was a discussion of Mary’s costumes that I can’t find again but I’m going to try to reconstruct it with some observations of my own.  You may have noticed that in her “widow” mode, Mary’s clothes are unusual.  She wears a dark skirt and menswear-style ensemble on top that looks like something from the Edwardian period (late 19th to early 20th century--almost 200 years after OFMD takes place).  (quick note here that it looks like she is wearing 18th c. stays underneath.  If this is true, interesting that the costume designer chose to build this intentionally ahistorical look on a historical silhouette).  

Much like her art (see above), this indicates visually that Mary is a  modern woman -futuristic even.  Being a widow has even given her the  freedom to gender-bend.   The thing that I noticed is that when we first meet her she’s not wearing a historically accurate costume either.  

For the wedding portrait she wears a dress that looks like something from the early Victorian era - about halfway between when the show takes place and what the widow costume evokes.  You can tell by the curve of her bust that she’s wearing a 19th century corset, not 18th century stays.  This tells me she was always a modern woman, ahead of her time.  Maybe not quite so much as she becomes by the end of the season, but the seeds are there.  (it’s possible that this was unintentional but with the amount of thought that seems to have gone into every aspect of OFMD I doubt it).   So when does Mary dress historically?  When she’s trapped in a loveless marriage that rigidly confines both her and Stede in gender roles they don’t want.  

Here we see the classic 18th century look, underpinnings and all.  A flat bust and layers of silk and frilly lace.  This futuristic woman is mired in the present and the restrictive role she is being forced to play.  The marriage was literally holding her back (in time!).  Even if we read Mary as straight (which is an interpretation I personally really like), we can tell, visually, that she isn’t comfortable in a married state either.  

[clove-pinks]

Can you run through the basics of 1870s men's fashion (circa 1875)? I know nothing about men's fashion and I need my character to be Plausible™

A great resource for a quick overview of 19th century fashion is the State University of New York Fashion Institute of Technology and their decade-by-decade fashion timelines: here's 1870-1879. It's legitimate and scholarly with sources cited so you can follow up on any claims and learn more about anything of interest!

I love Handbook of English Costume in the 19th Century by pioneering dress historians Phillis Cunnington and C. Willett Cunnington, which is also on Internet Archive (free account needed to access it). The FIT timeline notes that 1870s menswear is "marked by sobriety and understated style," and the Cunningtons add some additional context that the collapse of the French Empire after the Franco-Prussian War "produced a revulsion in France of anything savouring of 'Empire' style" which contributed to overall more subdued men's fashion.

Some other men's 1870s details from Handbook of English Costume in the 19th Century: trousers are all fly front and without a waistband, evening dress is generally black, and the "general absence of thin materials and light-weight cashmeres was characteristic of this warmly-clad buttoned-up decade." Dressing gowns with "fancy patterns and girdles of Berlin wool-work [a type of embroidery]". Men's jewellery less conspicuous and consisting only of "the heavy gold watch-chain across the waistcoat, the tie pin, and the signet-ring on the finger."

The difference between A, 1878 morning coat with Prussian collar, and B, an 1870 morning coat, shows the closer fit over the course of the decade. B looks very 1860s.

I think it's important to keep in mind that even the more somber, subdued menswear of the 1870s (especially compared to the 1820s-1840s) is still not as dark and boring as modern menswear.

Here's a fashion plate dated 1876 in the Met Collection. The gentleman at left is in riding dress with spurred topboots that wouldn't look out of place in 1830. Which brings me to another important point: throughout the 19th century, (middle class and upper class) men have Special Outfits for different occasions and activities. A man circa 1875 would want to have different outfits for participating in various sports, hunting, evening parties, daytime business wear, etc.

Two outdoorsy looks of 1876: yachting costume (A), and Norfolk jacket (B) "suitable for any kind of outdoor exercise."

A is a "business suit for all occasions" from 1873, and B is a frock coat of 1874.

Facial hair facial hair facial hair in all these looks, and men are still wearing plaids/checks! (Plaid: perhaps the most characteristic trait of all 19th century men's clothing). The Cunningtons quote the West End Gazette of Fashion from 1876 that "Our fast young men will find something to be noisy in, in the shape of loud plaids, the patterns more striking than tasteful."

[clove-pinks]

Thanks for the tag! The recent troubles of the Internet Archive have put a dent in my ability to recommend free online fashion history resources, but if Anon is still reading replies I highly recommend Handbook of English Costume in the 19th Century by Phillis Cunnington and C. Willett Cunnington.

The authors were pioneering dress historians, and half of the book is devoted to menswear of every 19th century decade, with reproduction primary source illustrations from art, fashion plates, etc. with quotes from periodicals and literature of the time period. It's great to see the authentic silhouettes, and they include accessories and clothing for different occasions. It's worthwhile to buy a physical copy of this book, but it's also available on Internet Archive (not at this time, unfortunately).

Hello, I have a question about fashion history.

Before I transitioned, I dressed 1850/1860s every day (with the accasional 1960s because miniskirts used to be fun before dysphoria took me hostage)

Currently my style is just misc vintage menswear, and despite all I look for in my fashion history books (the ones I use for my university costume course) I cannot figure out a way to make it more specific to certain era, other than with neck wear (but then you put a tie on and it could be any point in history again!)

What are some markers of specific periods in male historical fashion or what could I read to find out about them?

Ignore accessories right now and concentrate on fit and silhouette.

There is a world of difference between, say, 1840s and 1950s tailoring, even though men have been wearing suits & ties for ages now.

Look at these 2 fashion plates that were contemporary to the decades I just mentioned. Soft hourglass shape vs a sharp-edged wedge.

What I suggest is focusing on whatever era(s) you like best and picking apart the silhouette. Ask yourself things like:

How is this silhouette different from other eras?

Are the garments fitted or loose?

Where do pieces, like trousers, sit on the body?

How does the cut of the clothing influence the wearer's posture?

How does the fit of the clothing alter the wearers shape? What does it hide or change? What does it exaggerate?

What is it about a garment's construction that allows it to achieve these shapes? Pleats, darts, shaping via ironing, hidden structure/padding, etc?

Once you dial in the silhouette, you can then layer on details. But the silhouette is key to looking & feeling authentic!

[my18thcenturysource]

Hi, I'm trying to make an late 18th century waistcoat something like the (1880's to the 1890's) but the problem is that I don't know what 1880's waistcoats look like Idk what collar they are supposed to have or what shape and yes I have searched on Google but they show so many different waistcoats even if I put 1880's in the search it shows me stuff from the 17th century so maybe you have references I could take a look at? Thank you❤ (it's supposed to be not long and I guess a little bit fancy)

So, 19th century, right? 1880s-90s menswear might be tricky to make, since it is almost modern tailoring, and of course tailoring is an entire different animal with their own stitches, pattern making methods, fit and construction. So, it might not be an easy project if you have no background in tailoring. BUT a waistcoat is kind of the easier garments to make in tailoring, so here we go.

What makes 19th century tailoring very particular to our modern eyes is the fitting over the body and the silhouette of the garments (especially the trousers). Waistcoats were fitted very close to the body, especially during the first half of the century (the ones from the 1830s-50s have marvelous fabrics and colours, along with that tight fit that kind of competed with the women’s silhouettes). The shape is short, with long, with or without a collar, and fitted at the waist.

Here some inspiration:

1890s fashion plate showing (from left to right): frock, three button sack, tuxedo dress suit, clerical, and full dress suit.

Fashion plate from New York (1899), depicting a frock coat, morning coat, and lounge suit.

Two men posing for a portrait, 1880-1890.

Silk vest, late 1870s–early 1880s, American or European, The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Cotton vest, 1885–90, American or European, The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Silk vest, 1880s, American or European, The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Cord waistcoat with ivory buttons, 1880s, Great Britain, Victoria & Albert Museum.

Cashmere waistcoat, 1880-1889, Victoria & Albert Museum.

And an extra look for evening:

American full evening dress, c. 1890.

Tom Van Het Hof (@tom.van.het.hof in Instagram) wearing a vintage 1890s three-piece evening tailcoat.

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Some things you’ll have to keep in mind for this project:

The pattern is pretty easy to make, and here are instructions on how to make it (including how to take the measurements).

You’ll need two fabrics: the fashion fabric for the front and collar, and lining for the back.

Interlining is needed too, I prefer the one that is not iron-on (unless it’s your first time and boy, that is a lot easier).

Look for the stitches that you might need to use, especially if you decide to use decorative stitches.

Make a mock-up first. Always. And try it on a lot. The secret to the perfect fit is to try the mock on, adjust it, and make the needed changes.

DO NOT cut your real fabric until the mock-up is PERFECT.

[focsle]

A SPREAD OF WILDLY DIFFERENT REQUESTS BUT I WILL TAKE THEM. Perhaps with the exception of yours, @notactuallyherenotreally​, not out of distaste but out of the note that Period Appropriate Underthings would be HM, potentially nonexistent. Tho I could just draw him in a sleazy Shirt to honor both those requests in one go... BUT NOW I will clutch at this opportunity to go on about historical underwear (My Passion), and (at the risk of sounding like someone Destined for the Guillotine) about how Victorians and an emerging middle class ruined menswear.

In that, if we’re looking at 1818, underwear wasn’t necessarily a Must for men. The shirt was still the common Underthing. That’s why the shirttails were so damn long. One would just tuck them between the legs and call it a day. Though, this was also a sort of transitional period for menswear, and early 19th c. drawers DID exist a la:

But look at them. They’re cumbersome, and if you’re being Fashionable they could ruin the line of your REAL FUCKIN TIGHT PANTS.

When we look at the silhouette of early 19th c western menswear it was tied to an elite masculine ideal of basically being like. Landed Gentry. The ideal man was one who was rich and idle and looked pretty. So you get a cut like this:

Triangle. And it’s all about the leg. All about a well-turned calf. Ankles aren’t scandalous, it’s more like, HELLO LOOK AT MY ENTIRE LEG I MIGHT AS WELL NOT BE WEARING PANTS AT ALL BECAUSE I DON’T HAVE TO WORK. 

But then, mid 19th century the masculine ideal starts to shift away from increasingly unpopular notions of aristocracy and inherited wealth and more to the idea of a man who has achieved Success through his own means...or at least visually appears to have done so. A man for whom Tight Pants and Exaggerated Waists was impractical, unmanly. Your job is no longer to be Pretty but to be an Individualist Industrialist, and those look like rectangles:

This was just a long unsolicited way for me to say Early 19th C fashion is Ankles All The Way.