decades apart. We're not going to be talking about what affected fashion but

rather what the clothes looked like.

Everything in fashion happens gradually

so to understand what was going on at the beginning of a new century let's

move back a bit to 1790s.

1790s were a transition period. A new slender

silhouette came to fashion but it took a while till the ladies got rid of their

bum rolls, wigs and wide petticoats.

That's why in some Jane Austen movie adaptations you can still see the older

generation wearing older 18th century gowns, while the youngsters are dressed

in the empire fashion.

So in 1790s the waist gradually went higher, the skirts

got narrower, the hair smaller (though ladies still used to powder them), turbans

and ostrich feathers were the thing. Sleeves were usually elbow length.

What's typical for the era is that the skirts were gathered at the back of the dress

but also in front. That's why when we look at some of the 1790s fashion plates

nowadays all of the ladies look kind of pregnant. Also if you look at the back of

a late 1790s or early 1800s dress you can notice a very peculiar cut.

The sleeves heads were pushed back towards the shoulder blades and the back of the

dress was very short with the shortest point being in the center.

Women would even pad this bit of the skirt to make it look fuller.

Despite a circulating stereotype this new silhouette did not make women toss

corsets away. Some brave French fashionistas were not wearing them

that's true but corsets never completely disappeared

Mainly because the new silhouette required your bust to basically touch your chin.

And what better way to achieve that than some good old push-up bra?

I mean, stays.

The beginning of the 1800s saw the death of the heavily powdered hair

and classicism inspired hair-dos became all the rage.

Women would style their coiffures after antique sculptures and paintings.

The dresses also changed. Everyone got crazy about light delicate fabrics.

The skirts' trains were getting longer and longer, the busts were higher than ever

and the bodices were really short.

By 1810 the super long trains were no longer in fashion (no longer, get it? haha)

the skirts got wider and they became more trapezoidal in shape.

Rich Indian silks became fashionable.

The waist began gradually dropping around 1815.

Also the later in the decade the more decoration on the everyday outfits.

Grecian and Roman Hairstyles were adapted into a very popular look which

included curls on both sides of the face together with an intricate updo.

1820s were a transitional period from a classical empire silhouette to the

crazily over-the-top 1830s.

So the skirts got wider and wider shorter and shorter

the waist drop lower and lower the sleeves grew bigger and bigger and more

and more decorations started to appear on the dresses.

The hem of the skirts was

padded to help achieve the trapezoidal shape.

In 1830s everything kept growing

until the middle of the decade

and let me tell you got really intense.

Women would wear multiple petticoats some of them stiffened by cording or

horsehair to hold the volume of the skirts that were now shorter than ever.

They even wore special sleeve supports to make the sleeves bigger.

The waist was pretty low at this point

but still a bit higher than ladies' natural waists.

Thanks to Queen Victoria who was coronated in 1837 modesty and minimalism

came to fashion.

From 1836 everything started decreasing, the sleeve puffs started

moving downwards, the decoration started disappearing, the skirts were back to

floor length, the updos got flat and in the late 1830s the waist finally reached

its natural position.

1840s were a decade of earthy colors, fitted pointy bodices,

and fitted sleeves, tight collars usually separately attached, and small

geometrical patterns.

Basically everything got tighter and the only

thing that kept growing was the width of women's skirts that required more and

more support.

Popular hair style was a low bun and the middle parting and that with

some minor modifications was a hot look up until the late 1860s.

In the 1850s the problem of growing skirts became so big (big, got it?) that it was necessary to

develop a special construction to help them stay in shape and not floppy.

That construction was called crinoline and it was patented in 1856.

Now note that the crinoline did not exist until then so if you hear about

18th century crinolines, that's absolute nonsense.

18th century ladies were hoop skirts or panniers.

1850s skirts were often ruffled which is an

easy way to tell them apart from 1840s skirts.

Same goes for the sleeves which

in 1850s were wide and called pagoda sleeves.

Women would often wear fake

white sleeves underneath so they could peek from the pagoda sleeves.

The waist dropped a little bit below the actual waist level and got longer in the front

Plaid dresses were all the rage as well as floral motives.

In 1860s the shape of the

whole silhouette started changing.

After the waist reached its lowest point in

1850s it started going a little bit above the natural waist level in the 1860s.

Buttoned bodices became fashionable, the ruffled plaid skirts were gone and

instead plain solid colors were in fashion, with geometrical trimmings such

as the Greek key decorating the hems.

The shape of the skirt changed slightly and

so did the shape of the crinoline underneath, accentuating the back.

Apart from being gathered or pleated at the waist some skirts were also made of panels.

From about 1867 the transitional period started.

The waist would start

traveling even higher but the skirt this time instead of

expanding on decreasing would start getting more volume at the back

It would also gradually become more and more decorated.

The crinolines gradually

morphed into crinolettes and then around the beginning of 1870s into bustles.

That's how we enter the bustle era.

1870s where a decade I would compare

to 1830s - big hair, a lot of decorations, frills, flowers, laces, pinks and pastels.

A huge inspiration for 1870s was 18th century fashion and you can kind of tell.

Even the hairstyles were sort of Marie Antoinette inspired.

Some people would literally take old family dresses from let's say 1780s and redo them into fashionable creations.

Dresses were also influenced by Renaissance and medieval fashions.

About the butts - the 1870s bustle was large and the skirt was in

trapezoidal shape.

To accentuate the silhouette even more women would wear

two skirts one of them was an underskirt which went - surprise surprise - under, and

the other went on top and was called the over skirt.

Over skirts were draped to

make the butts look even bigger.

And then, suddenly the butts disappeared!

Around 1878 women dropped the big bustles and chose to wear small bum pads instead.

The skirts got really narrow but instead of the fullness the designers came up with

length and added long trains.

This look called the natural form era lasted for

only about four years because around 1882, the bustles were back on track!

Remember what happened after 1830s?

Minimalism, geometry, earthy tones

strictness - well this sort of happened after the 1870s too.

1880s are known as the second bustle era and though at first glance might look

similar to 1870s there are some significant differences that make it

easier to tell them apart.

Firstly the skirts are not the trapezoidal shape anymore.

They were just a little bit wider than the hips.

Secondly the shape of the corset changed slightly.

Spoon busked corsets came into fashion giving

the illusion of a full belly and I swear I'm not making it up.

And from a more harsh geometrical 1870s shape, a curvy wavy 1880s shape evolved.

Thirdly, the bustles shape or rather angle changed.

Instead of gradually going down

the bustles formed a sort of shelf on the ladies bottoms.

Fourthly (if that's even a word) ladies' hairstyles changed.

Women would also start cutting their

forehead hair and setting it into frizzy bangs.

Not the most flattering look but

if you have bangs this is one of the rare 19th century fashion history

moments when this look is historically accurate.

So as you probably noticed, changes in fashion history usually start with something gradually growing or

decreasing or getting longer or shorter so because skirts kept changing all the

time at the beginning of the 1890s people were like "Hey what about the sleeves"

Sleeves it is then - from 1890 to around 1895 the sleeves were getting

bigger and bigger and bigger and to balance the huge sleeves the skirts

also had to get wider if you wonder what happened to the bustle well it kind of disappeared.

The only reminder that the bustle was ever there was a peculiar

pleat at the back of the skirts in early 1890s but those pleats disappeared after a while too.

1890s where a time where art noveau was kind of huge so you can see

that in the clothes and the way they're cut and made.

Floral and geometrical designs

cover the dresses, jackets and coats from the era.

What I especially love about the

1890s is the collars so especially the coats and capes from the era jackets and

generally speaking outerwear often had very high spiky collars you know they're

Maleficent kind of collar

The skirts changed once again from trapezoidal

wide skirts in the middle of 1890s to tulip-shaped narrower skirts by the end of the decade.

Later in the decade women also started getting rid of the weird frizzy

bangs and a puffy more art nouveau appropriate style was introduced.

1890s were the time of a big discussion around tight lacing, corsets and how they affect

women's health.

Tight lacing wasn't very popular before but by the end of 19th

century more and more fashionistas desired small waists.

So the solution to

the problem was an invention of an s-bend corset or a health corset in 1900.

It completely changed women's silhouette but that's kind of a whole another story

so maybe I'll tell you about that when we're discussing 20th century I hope now

I hope now when you hear about something being "Victorian- or "19th century style" you

know there is no such thing because 19th century was such a huge piece of fashion

history with countless silhouettes cuts and styles.

Anyway I hope you enjoyed

this messy explanation obviously, I missed a lot of things and some

things I listed as a typical thing for one decade we're actually also popular

in other decades but just to give you a general idea.

Ok, thanks for listening and

see you next time hopefully.