Costume

“ Indeed, nobody can tell what is the real dress, there are nothing but dress fragments, piled one upon the other, each successive one shaped and draped more idiotically than the other, and, perhaps, of a different color, so that the ideal costume seems to be the one made up of the most senseless accumulation and mixture of rags and colors imaginable. ”

“ Like all well-made, high-bred men he looked at his best in the dress which fashion has decreed shall be the evening costume of gentlemen. She had thought him handsome, noble, in the easy, careless suit of velvet, she knew that he was distinguished looking in his suit of evening sables. ”

“ It was early morning, and few people were yet abroad. But the costume of those whom I met seemed strange and fantastic to me. Moreover, I noticed that they all turned and looked after me with evident surprise, as though my dress caused them quite as much astonishment as theirs caused me. I was quietly attired in my snuff-coloured suit of small-clothes, with silk stockings and simple buckle shoes, and I had of course no hat; but I gathered that my appearance caused universal amazement and concern, far more than could be justified by the mere accidental absence of head-gear. ”

“ I heard for the first time the confused buzz of voices speaking a different language from that to which I had been accustomed; and saw a costume very unlike that worn on the opposite side of the channel; the women with high caps and short jackets; the men with earrings; ladies walking about with high bonnets or coiffures lodged on the top of the head, the hair dragged up underneath, without any stray curls to decorate the temples or cheeks. ”

“ No one has ever understood breeches and stockings better than he, or the human leg, that delight of the draughtsman, as the costume of the last century permitted it to be known. The petticoat and bodice of the same period have as little mystery for him, and his women and girls have altogether the poetry of a by-gone manner and fashion. ”

“ I had just taken in all these details by a glance, when there entered a tall thin man of gentlemanly appearance, clad in a rough tweed suit, with a scarlet shirt, open at the throat, a simple but dégagé style of costume, which he seemed to wear with a natural grace, for it is not every man who can dress thus and still retain an air of distinction. ”

“ Chancing upon a book of costume, which included details of the dress worn by a tribe known as the Wotiaks, who inhabit a small village in Siberia, I learned that the women wear a peculiar costume consisting of a shift of coarse linen, slit in front like a man's shirt, and hemmed up at either side with worsted of different colours. ”

“ The ladies, I am sorry to say, are even rather worse in this matter than the gentlemen. The female costume consists generally of robes of sheep and goat skins thrown across the shoulders; while a long tail of twisted worsted plaits, looking like a collection of old-fashioned bell-ropes, forms the chief decoration. ”

“ Needlessly is the attention distracted by these anachronisms which upset the spectator’s equanimity in a play that is pulsating with ever-living human emotion. Then, again, costume is an essential adjunct in drama, as an indication of character. We know at a glance a man’s rank, his wealth, and his taste, by the aid of his clothes, provided always that we are familiar with the period in which the apparel was worn. ”

“ But there was something in the change from simplicity of dress, that almost approached to homeliness, to the costly elegance of costume that was now before him, which seemed to indicate a position to which his own no longer presented so very favourable a contrast. ”

“ Then she understands so well the art and mystery of dressing. While other young ladies around her were in the full pride of brilliant costume, the eye felt freshened and relieved when looking at her—there was such a repose in her demi-toilette. ”

“ Let us remember that the costume of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries was distinguished by a quality of beautiful, sweeping line, massed colour, detail with raison d'être, which produced dignity with graceful movement, found nowhere to-day, unless it be on the Wagnerian stage or in the boudoir of a woman who still takes time, in our age of hurry, to wear her negligée beautifully. ”

“ This costume—in point of opacity imperfectly superior to a gentle breeze—is not always discernible in the sculptures; but it is charitably believed that the pellucid garment, being merely painted over the figures, has been ravished away by the hand of Time—the wretch! ”

“ The men gazed on her as something more than mortal, the character of her features heightened by costume strange to their eyes, seemed to astonish almost as much as it captivated them—while the women, with more critical discernment, examined her more composedly, but, perhaps, with not less admiration ”

“ How well each in its way is calculated to serve the purpose for which it is designed, the simple cloth, tweed, or serge costume moulded to the lines of the figure, adapted to our changeful climate, and giving a cachet to the wearer, not always found in much more costly apparel, a rational costume in the best sense of the word, and one which women of all ages may assume with satisfaction to themselves and to those with whom [Pg 11] they come in contact. ”

“ She wore a costume that struck the boy as being remarkably brilliant: her silken waist being of emerald green and her skirt of four distinct colors—blue in front, yellow at the left side, red at the back and purple at the right side. ”

“ I think that designers of theatrical costume as a rule are altogether oblivious of the special requirements of individual faces and figures. To the designer, it seems to me, the actress is merely a note of colour in his general scheme. Only that, and nothing more! I would urge that exactly the same kind of costume cannot possibly be becoming alike to tall, majestic women and a little insignificant nez retroussé person like me! ”

“ Though I knew what to expect in the costume of a woman of the upper classes, I was astonished, and should have been scandalised even had women only been present. The costume of ladies has undergone a great change in the last ninety years, and the extreme of the fashion is as lacking in delicacy as it is in comfort. ”

“ We will begin to treat of costume as it was in the days of Louis XIV., the solemn mood and ideas of whom exerted their influence even on dress, and the era which saw all other arts become pompous and labored, also saw costume assume the most complicated character. ”

“ Costume consists of a suit of coarse material, sleeves rolled up to the elbow, leather apron tied about the waist, paper cap on the head, red or gray wig, and shaggy beard. The old lady's costume consists of a cheap calico dress, white ruffled cap, white handkerchief tied about the neck, and spectacles on the nose. The light must come from the right side of the stage, and be of medium brilliancy. ”

“ How was Fashion created, you ask? To answer thoroughly, we must once more go back to those distant cave-man days when dress itself had its inception. At first one simple costume for both men and women distinguished each tribe. There was nothing different in the way the skins were thrown over the body, no embellishments to render any one costume different from those worn by the others. ”

“ At present each tries to outdo the other in style and variety of costume. Their shoes are high-heeled, cloth-topped, their blouses lacy and collarless, their hats absurd. We propose a costume which shall be neat, becoming, and appropriate. Not exactly a uniform, perhaps, but something with a fixed idea in cut, color, and style. A corps of twelve young ladies belonging to our best families has been chosen to speak to the shop girls at noon meetings on the subject of good taste, health, and morality in women's dress. ”

“ The roads are knee deep in mire, winding through crags and pits, while the wheels groan and totter and the curtain and roof admit the wet at a thousand seams.” We learn the proper costume for a youth of good fortune and family,—“nankeen coat striped with green, a white silk waistcoat elegantly needle-wrought, cassimere pantaloons, stockings of variegated silk, and shoes that in their softness vie with satin.” ”

“ Give most careful attention to your extremities,—shoes, gloves and hats. The genius of fashion's greatest artist counts for naught if his costume may not include hat, gloves, shoes, and we would add, umbrella, parasol, stick, fan, jewels; in fact every detail.
If you have the good sense to go to one who deservedly ranks as an authority on line and colour in woman's costume, have also the wisdom to get from this man or woman not merely your raiment ”

“ The young lady's costume consists of a loose dressing gown, trimmed around the top and on the ends of the sleeves with bands of red cloth, and gold paper cut in the form of diamonds. The hair should hang loosely over the shoulders, and about the head entwine a string of beads; the head is slightly turned to the young man ”

“ No wonder, then, that nine-tenths of the top-knotted consorts look regular bags as they walk about. The national costume itself, it must be confessed, does rather tend to deform the appearance of the human body, which it is supposed to adorn. ”

“ A new thing in costume appears--the flaring hoopskirt, for example--and the passers-by are shocked, and the irreverent laugh. Six months later everybody is reconciled; the fashion has established itself ”

“ It is quite a sufficient warrant, at all events, for giving dress a small part in this chapter; besides, the costume of any individual or society is both a sure indicator of qualities and an apt focus for judgment. ”

“ In the various forms of riding-dress, again, we get a certain freedom and variety in costume through adaptation, both in men and women’s dress.
What modern costume really lacks is not so much character and picturesqueness, as beauty and romance—a general indictment which might be brought against modern life. We are really ruled by the dead weight of the prosaic, the prudent, the timid, the respectable, over and above the specializing adaptive necessities of utility before mentioned. ”

“ As you will see, I have devoted myself entirely to civil costume—that is, the clothes a man or a woman would wear from choice, and not by reason of an appointment to some ecclesiastical post, or to a military calling, or to the Bar, or the Bench. ”

“ There, I say, the master of the Company having commanded that every man should present himself dressed in whatever costume he pleased, on condition that those who might resemble one another in their manner of dress by being clothed in the same fashion, should pay a penalty, at the appointed hour there appeared the most beautiful, bizarre, and extravagant costumes that could be imagined. ”

“ No costume in itself could be more desirable or better adapted to the work of the wearers, and a more general rather than a more restricted use of this form of dress should be advocated on theoretical grounds. ”

“ Turning from the aspects of houses to humans—take modern dress—in our search for the beautiful! Well National if not distinctive costume—except of the working and sporting sort, court dress, collegiate robes and uniforms—has practically disappeared, and, apart from working dress in working hours, one type of ceremonial, or full dress, is common to the people at large, and that of the plainest kind, with whatever differences of cut and taste in detail. ”

“ In costume, the visitor had evidently been guided rather by individual taste than by the dictates of fashion. His coat was of rusty black, his trousers of gray, picked out with stains of various colors. ”

“ There is one distinction between ours and all other books on dress that have come under our observation, and that is, that we are dealing with the necessary and not the ornamental part of clothing. Most authors have written upon the history of costume, or the absurdity or elegance of some particular fashion, or of the harmony of the colours and relation of the dress to the figure of the individual—have dealt only with the exterior. ”

“ The costume worn by the victim is, of course, that of the goddess herself, and we may, perhaps, infer that the wooden knife she carried, the purpose of which was to press cloth, was symbolical of one of the domestic duties of the older women, whom she appears in a measure to have represented. ”

“ We have laid down a sort of rule that the costume of servants is that of the master of an earlier generation, and we will now bring forward some evidence in support of it.
Modern coachmen and outdoor footmen wear the tall hat, the bright buttons, doeskin breeches and the top boots characteristic of the outdoor and riding dress of the gentlemen at the beginning of the nineteenth century. ”

“ I regret, from the practical as well as the artistic point of view, the threatened disappearance of local colouring, as emphasised by the characteristic costume of the people, for I am convinced that the adoption of a uniform style of dress by a community greatly furthers the cause of neatness and economy. ”

“ I feel grateful to any woman I meet, who rests my rainbow-sated eye by a modest, tasteful costume. I thank every well-made man who passes me with well-knit limbs and expanded chest, en [Pg 243] cased in nice linen, and a coat he can breathe in ”

“ There 's a kind of dress just now the fashion among ladies, that confuses me fully as much,—a species of gauzy, filmy, floating costume that makes you always feel quite near, and yet keeps you a considerable distance off. It's a most bewitching, etherial style of costume, and especially invented, I think, for the bewilderment of elderly gentlemen.
More than half of the effect of a royal visit to a man's own house is in the contrast presented by an illustrious presence to the little commonplace objects of his daily life. ”

“ On turning round I was surprised to find myself face to face with a gentleman, in a bright blue coat with metal buttons, a white waistcoat, nankeen breeches, and top-boots. This costume, which might have been the fashion under the Directory, was then quite out of date. ”