All
the changes happening in industry and transport brought a new kind of
prosperity to Britain and many people chose to showthis prosperity in their homelife.
The Victorians associated
the clutter of ornamentation and ostentatious display with wealth and so crammed their homes with
furniture,bric-a-brac and pianos to show
their refinement and taste.
An after dinner scene showing the busy
Victorian interior. It shows the ostentatious display of wealth through costume,
ownership of a piano and other objects.
The glorious full skirted evening dresses belong at the
pinnacle of the
fashion
history era of the crinoline when fullness in skirts had started to move to
the back of dresses.
The taste for heavy balloon typefurniture may have been a
reaction to the earlier lighter Regency furniture.
Mahogany
framed sofas were magnificent. Beautiful carving highlighted
the vast mahogany curves. French polished
rooms were liked and sometimes
rosewood was used as darker woods were fashionable.
Right - Typical Victorian balloon back chair.
Vastness
of scale in home furniture was essential because from 1840 from the waist down, women looked
like bells. They needed big generous seats to spread their wide expanding
skirts.Seat
backs were rounded forms. The
balloon back chair born in the 1830s remained popular until 1860s.In the 1850s the bentwood chair
became popular.The pretty decorative papier-mâché
chair inlaid with mother-of-pearl,cane seated, scrolled and gilded
also reached its
peak in these days.
By the mid 1850sstaircases
also became wider and they helped accommodate crinoline skirts. Ladies swept
down stairs in a flurry of petticoats.
A
double seat called the tête a tête enabled women to spread their skirts to
help prevent crushing and flirt with a man at the same time without being
compromised by sitting too closely. The separating backrest prevented bodies
touching and were ideal for couples getting to know each other in a restrained
respectable way.
Home
interiors were quite
dark with busily patterned wallpaper. From a picture rail hung oil paintings,
etchings, engravings, silhouettes, water colours, stitched needlework samplers
and hand embroidered reproductions of famous paintings.
Sunlight was kept out
of the already dark room by layers of blinds, lace curtains, velvet drapes, and side curtains in dark
colours.The brass ringed curtains hung
on great poles, but often remained drawn on bright days.
Above Left - Eclectic interior showing a reflecting
mirror, tête a tête chair and bric a brac.
Clutter
of furniture and ornaments was reflected in the huge looking glasses.
Furniture and shelves were covered with fringed, beaded cloths and
runners.
The more a home could be over filled with china, domed wax flowers,
stuffed birds, trinket boxes, the more homelife could be reflected in mirrors,
the more it showed its owner had arrived to the full Victorian lifestyle.
Status
was reflected in the purchase of items for the home. Status was reflected in the
size of a home. Status meant having home servants. Status meant house parties
where prosperity in homelife could be shown off to others. Status was so
important that home lifestyle was truly invented by wealthy Victorians.
Fashion-Era.com looks at women's costume and fashion history and analyses the mood of an era. Changes in technology, leisure, work, cultural and moral values. Homelife and politics also
contribute to lifestyle trends, which in turn influence the clothes we wear. These are the changes that make any era of society special in relation to the study of the costume of a period.
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