Customer Reviews

Victorian to Vamp: Women's Clothing 1900-1929

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1 star:		(1)

 

 

As a fan of these three eras in fashion, I had high hopes for this book, but the front cover is the best thing about it. The most grievous problem with this book is that, focussing as it does on such a limited time span, it should go into depth about that time span. It does not. The descriptions of fashions of the eras are too generalized and don't indicate how and when changes within the eras took place; since fashion was changing pretty rapidly by the end of the 19th century, and certainly by the beginning of the 20th, I expected much more attention to chronology and gradual changes.

The illustrations are also scanty and often of poor quality; some look as though they were made by tracing the outline of another illustration. I could have forgiven the shortcomings of the text had this book provided lots of illustrations, which is the main reason I suspect many of us buy books on fashion history. This book has a great premise, but it is very unhelpful.

I had read several encouraging reviews and decided to purchase this book; and unfortunately, I feel that I wasted my money.

On the plus side, while the author says nothing new, she does a good job of going over social and fashion trends of the time; I will give her credit for a decent job of writing and research.

But for me, as for other vintage fashion enthusiasts, any book on historical garments must include lots, and I mean lots, of great illustrations, whether photographs or reprints from contemporary periodicals and catalogs. This is where "Victorian to Vamp" falls disappointingly short.

The reprints are of indifferent quality, a couple of them quite crude (the author couldn't get her hands on a better picture of Amelia Jenks Bloomer? Come on!). And for a book of this type, why oh why couldn't the editors have sprung for a couple of prints in color?

If the author would care to reissue this with the help of a better photo/print researcher, I might be tempted to revise my opinion.

Victorian To Vamp: Women's Clothing 1900-1929 explores the evolving dress styles of women from 1900 until the Great Depression, a time when the oppressive and constrictive styles of the Victorian Era were giving way to a new freedom in women's clothing with the advent of the modern short skirt and loose chemise dresses. Paula Darnell's informative text is illustrated throughout with line drawings and black/white photography. Victorian To Vamp will prove valued and engaging reading for costumers, popular culture historians, and writers seeking accuracy respecting details of women's clothing styles and trends during the first three decades of the nineteenth century.

I particularly enjoyed the illustrations of the period fashions, as the line drawings and photographs of the clothing are indicative of the appearance of the Victorian and early modern attire worn by the women of the day. The book is especially well organized, and I appreciate the informative content regarding the various fashions of the period. The book provides a splendid overview of the time, highlighting the most important and outstanding elements of the period's fashion design. It is an aesthetically pleasing and well-written book that is highly recommended for anyone who wants to learn about the bridge between the fashions of the 1800s and modern times. A five-star book for sure!

"Victorian to Vamp: Women's Clothing 1900-1929" has been out of print for some time, and I made special effort to track down a copy. I wanted it for my own research on women's clothing of the Edwardian, Titanic, and WW1 eras, as there's very little in the way of reference material dedicated to that period. Unfortunately, this particular book is far less helpful than I had hoped.

There are a number of flaws in this particular text, chief among them being the author's lack of focus. The book's target era is 1900-1929, but the author jumps far earlier than this a number of times. The dress reform movements of the 19th century are an important topic, but this survey is not the place to go into them, and adding illustrations of garments from 1850-1899 serves only to confuse the issue.

Furthermore, the author also does not maintain a clear timeline, even when she stays within her target era; the first illustration in the book is from 1897, the next is from 1920, the third from 1903, the fourth is from 1907, and the fifth is an undated illustration of shirtwaist blouses that can be identified as 1904-1905 based on the sleeves and hairstyles. This scattershot approach continues throughout the book.

The illustrations are also of uneven quality. The author uses several family photographs, which are quite useful for showing what average people actually wore from day-to-day. Also included are illustrations taken from prominent fashion magazines. A number of these illustrations, however, look as though they were reproduced from second- or third-generation xeroxes. Worse yet is the author's choice to use a couple of obviously hand-drawn illustrations that were copied from photographs and engravings, and are so poorly rendered that it's difficult to get a feel for what the person depicted is wearing. Copyright issues are a bear to nail down sometimes, but it is far better to take the effort to reproduce the original image than include a badly-drawn copy.

There is a certain sloppiness to the writing as well. She constantly refers to that stalwart of fashion magazines, _The Delineator_, simply as "Delineator". (The "The" is on the cover for a reason.) When discussing women's undergarments of the 1920s, she indicates on one page that women had eschewed the heavily boned stays of earlier decades for lighter foundations, and on another that the flat, boyish look of the period required significant corsetry for the average woman. (Note: I've seen a number of examples of corsets and girdles from the 1920s, and many of them are every bit as restrictive and heavy-boned as the most outrageous 1912 thigh-hobbling long-line.) She completely ignores reasons for changes in fashionable dress of the target years, in favor of illustrations of bathing and bicycling costumes from 1884 and 1894, respectively. Taken with her chaotic approach (see: timeline issues), it's nearly impossible for the reader to get any idea of how clothing styles developed.

It comes down to this: as an antique clothing enthusiast, I expect better treatment of the subject matter from someone who also claims to be passionate about the clothing of this era. On the other hand, this period is so poorly documented compared to some others (the Civil War and Bustle Eras, particularly), I hesitate to completely steer people away from the book. It has a two-page bibliography, but further research will be required to decide if the bibliography is of any use.