Index 

Links & Other Resources

On-line Collections  |  Hard-Copy Resources  |  Brick & Mortar Collections

On-line Collections

Main sources from which material was compiled:

Démodé  http://demode.tweedlebop.com/realvict.html 
a compendium of historical costume related sources, including a lengthy 
bibliography of online images of clothes (from which many
of the pictures on this site are taken).

V&A  http://www.vam.ac.uk 
The best dress collection I have found--very large high-quality color photos, generally fitting well 
on unobtrusive manikins in reasonable poses with appropriate hairstyles.  

Centraal Museum (Utrecht) http://www.centraalmuseum.nl/nl_/nl_dat/
An extensive collection of dresses & accessories; though of high resolution, they
are oddly mostly B&W; however, the collection also offers some "kleur" (color) images of some of
their dresses.  Some of these images are very large very high-quality traditional
poses; others, whimsical and bizarre, depict the dresses running amok
in the museum (in the ladies' room, standing behind a bank of computers, hiding in
a warehouse...).  Inexplicable but endearing.

Kyoto Costume Institute  http://www.kci.or.jp/menu-e.html 
Offers a very extensive collection of photographs, though the
quality of the images is not always the best

Museum of the City of New York  http://www.mcny.org/Collections/costume/worth/worth.htm
Offer medium-quality images of fabulous Gilded-Age gowns by the House of Worth.  
Also have an on-line exhibit on shoes & fans.

Smithsonian  http://americanhistory2.si.edu/costume/browse.cfm?order=datemade
The American History Museum offers a costume collection online, each image with a 
comprehensive write-up.  Medium-quality & -size images.

The Met's Costume Institute  http://www.metmuseum.org/Works_of_Art/department.asp?dep=8
Offers 50 images of highlights of their permanent collection, as well as images from recent
exhibitions.  The Timeline of 18c European Dress (http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/eudr/hd_eudr.htm) 
is also very illuminating, containing mini-essays on the mutations of 18c style.  Photographs of costume
collection appear to have been overhauled; many older pictures from the site are no longer accessible--ugly
manikins in odd poses replaced by more professional production values. 

Musee Galliera  http://www.paris.fr/musees/musee_galliera/default.htm 
The photos that I copied from the MusGall appear to be no longer available.  
The site now offers much more professional images, but far fewer of them.

Museo Piraino (Museo del Costume di Palermo)  http://www.museopiraino.it/ 
A collection of clothes from 1700-1950.  Covers men, women, children, the military, underclothes, & accessories.  
Image quality varies, but does offer a write-up (in Italian) of its pieces.

Musee McCord  http://www.mccord-museum.qc.ca/ 
Offers an easy-to-find and easy-to-search database of images from its
collection, varying in quality from excellent to middling.

Museum of Costume, Bath  http://www.museumofcostume.co.uk 
Their Highlights page links to images from their collection, arranged by century.
Good to medium quality.

Vintage Textiles http://www.vintagetextiles.com 
A commercial site offering fabulous (& fabulously expensive) antique clothes.
Commercial sites sometimes provide more extensive views and 
descriptions of their clothes than do museums--this one in particular
features informed commentary, quality photographs, and multiple
views of each item.

Private Collection of Nancy L. Saputo, cited on http://locutus.ucr.edu/~cathy/rd/rd.html 

Kent State University Museum  http://dept.kent.edu/museum/costume/index.asp 
Their Visual Dictionary of Costume provides multiple views of a wide variety of ensembles from both genders
beginning in the 1700s.  The image quality is middling.

1830s: http://www.connerprairie.org/historyonline/clothing.html 

The Costume Page (a list of links) http://members.aol.com/nebula5/costume.html

historical patterns  http://www.landescostumes.com/ifprae/  

Other Online Exhibits

adapted from http://www.gbacg.org/collections.htm

Hard-Copy Resources  

Gernsheim, Alison.  Victorian and Edwardian Fashion:  A Photographic Survey.  New York:  Dover Pub., 1963.
Written at an accessible but detailed level, copiously illustrated (235 illustrations) with period photographs, 
demonstrating fashions in action.

Steele, Valerie.  The Corset:  A Cultural History.  New Haven:  Yale UP, 2001.
Discusses the history of corsets, their significance, medical myths on the subject, fetishism, 
and other topics.  Written from a contemporary feminist perspective that is more interested 
in why women made particular choices and what advantages they gained from those choices, 
rather than in demonizing the corset and portraying its wearers as hapless victims.

Ashelford. Jane.  The Art of Dress:  Clothes & Society 1500-1914.  London:  National Trust, 1996.
Uses paintings and images of extant clothes to discuss the history of dress, with a strong
interest in correlating fashions to the politics and history of their times.

Rothstein, Natalie, ed.  Four Hundred Years of Fashion.  London:  V&A Publications, 1984.
Contains essays on the evolution of fashions and images from the V&A's collection,
presenting an overview of the eras.  Detailed descriptions of each item are given in the back.  
More an extensive than an intensive work, due to the time range covered.

Goldthorpe, Caroline.  From Queen to Empress:  Victorian Dress 1837-1877.  New York:  Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1988.
Provides a detailed discussions of the permutations of fashions in mid-century.  
Well-illustrated guide, though with less emphasis on the clothes of Queen Victoria 
herself than the title might suggest.  Very accessible, 87 pg.

Buck, Anne.  Victorian Costume, Revised 2nd ed.  Bedford:  Ruth Bean, 1984.
Rather technical and consequently hard to read, particularly as there are insufficient 
photographs bunched together,and the text relies heavily on line drawings.

International Brick & Mortar Collections

copied from http://www.gbacg.org/collections.htm

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