A HISTORY OF FASHION AND COSTUME: VOLUME 6 – THE VICTORIAN AGE

Peter Chrisp

Bailey Publishing Associates Ltd., Hove, England

Year 2005

Pages 64

An eight-volume set examining the development of costume and fashion and the social history that gave rise to it. It depicts the changing styles, processes, and trends – from the first people to wear clothes in the last Ice Age to the courtly fashion of medieval Europe and to the globalization of Western style – that led us to the clothing of today. This volume says that the British queen, Victoria, has given her name to the era between 1837 and 1901, the years of her reign, the longest of any British ruler. The Victorian era was a period of world as well as British history, for the queen ruled at a time when Britain had a vast global empire, including a quarter of the planet’s population. It was a time of massive social change. Clothing was transformed by factory production, and by new inventions such as the sewing machine. Cheap clothes could now be mass produced. The period saw the birth of a true fashion industry, with the first department stores, fashion magazines, and mail-order catalogs, allowing people living in Melbourne and San Francisco to follow the latest European styles.