Recent Acquisitions: Full Dress for Assemblies in the Persian Style

If you’ve been reading this blog for any length of time, you know how I feel about my prints from Ackermann’s Repository: they were exquisitely engraved and colored, were of uniformly excellent quality during the twenty years of the journal’s existence, and are a total delight. But that doesn’t mean one of the other great publications of the Regency era, La Belle Assemblée, doesn’t have its moments as well.

One of those moments occurred in the December 1807 issue of the magazine, with the appearance of a plate titled Full Dress for Assemblies in the Persian Style.  I’ll let you admire it for a moment before we proceed.

The description accompanying the gown is curious, for it doesn’t seem to describe the dress very well in many particulars. One wonders if the colorist wasn’t given the description, and made her own decision about which colors to use. In addition, while the plate reads “Persian” style, the description heading reads “Parisian.” Oops:

A Ball Dress in the Parisian Style

A Neapolitan robe and petticoat, of white, or coloured satin, made quite plain. Armorial vest of white satin, beaded in gold stripes. A cestus [a girdle or belt] á-la-Cleopatra, composed of wrought gold and amethysts. Hanging sleeve, gathered in front of the arm, with brooches of the same. The hair confined from the roots, the ends flowing in irregular curls, leaving the forehead and temples exposed. An Indian casque of tissue, with amethyst ornaments. A long veil of gossamer gause, rounded at the end, and embroidered in a delicate border of silver, or silk, flowing from the centre of the crown, over the right shoulder, and forming a drapery in front of the figure by the attitude of the left hand. Pear earrings of amethyst or pearl. Necklace of pearl, with amethyst star in the centre. White satin slippers, edge with silver beading, and white kid gloves above the elbow.

I can’t help wondering what held on the fez-like hat (close-up above)—presumably some description of hairpin. And it would have been remarkably tedious to have to hold onto the veil for the entire evening to "form a drapery in front of the figure." This may have been a dress to wear to balls and assemblies, but probably not one to dance in. 

Nevertheless, whether Persian or Parisian, it’s a delight. Would you like to have worn this one?

Shelf Space

Oh, those lovely dresses Marissa shows us! They make my little larcenous costumer’s heart go pitter-pat. I’m certain any number of nineteenth-century young ladies had a similar reaction when they saw the prints in their favorite women’s magazine. We’ve talked about some of the ways those dresses became reality. But once you had them, what did you do with them when you weren’t wearing them?

The closets we generally take for granted did not exist in the nineteenth century. Oh, there were rooms for storing things, and a wealthy lady might have a dressing room devoted to her gowns and accoutrements. But the hanger (wire or wooden) wasn’t in wide use until the twentieth century, and most closets were not designed to hold hanging clothing. Instead, you or your maid gently folded your gowns into a clothes press.

I must admit, I had these envisioned all wrong. Somehow I had in my mind what my family calls a hope chest—a large cedar box. I’d also thought they might look a bit like a wardrobe ala The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe. Thank goodness I’ve never written a scene with great detail on the things, because this week I discovered my error.

Here are some examples of clothes presses. This first one is of the low variety, made of mahogany, dating from the early nineteenth century. Inside the center panels are five sliding trays. You pull them out and lay on your dresses. The drawers are for your fripperies like fans, shawls, and gloves.


Then there’s the higher version, also from early in the century. This is also mahogany, with birds eye maple banding. Looks a bit like a wardrobe, doesn’t it?


However, instead of a space to hang things, you’ll find those pull out drawers again.


Some, however, were quite fanciful. Check out this one, inspired by Chinese influences.


Or this one, from 1840. The door panels are inlaid with ebony, and the drawers are lined with oak.


It also actually has places to hang clothes on either side, although they may have been added later, as they are separate pieces from the clothes press.


They are lovely pieces of furniture, but I can’t help wondering how many I would need. As I have confessed before, I am something of a clothes horse. Think my husband would mind building a dressing room to store all my clothes presses? Or maybe a small house?