Textile Weekend Highlights 19th-Century Fashion Accessories Aug. 17-18
(STURBRIDGE, MA) - Aug. 2, 2013: Old Sturbridge Village is offering free admission for kids in the month of August, including during the Village's annual Textile Weekend celebration Aug. 17-18. For this year's Textile Weekend, Village historians are highlighting 19th-century fashion accessories and visitors can tour the new "Trimmed to Taste" exhibit, which salutes the clever creativity of early New England seamstresses. For details: www.osv.org; 800-SEE-1830.
The museum's free children's admission offer in August extends through Labor Day Sept. 2, 2013. All kids age 17 and younger get free admission to Old Sturbridge Village when accompanied by an adult - an $8 value per child. (The offer does not apply to educational groups or to Discovery Adventures).
Other activities planned for OSV's Textile Weekend Aug. 17-18 include bonnet-making, dress-making, mending, and shoe-making demonstrations, knitting for the troops, and paper doll crafts. Also, historians will show how they made an historic portrait "come alive" by authentically reproducing the clothing portrayed in the painting.
With a taste for high fashion, but often without the budget, women in early New England became adept at updating their wardrobes simply by changing their accessories. Adding a new look with bonnets, belts, cuffs, collars, and combs was a clever way to achieve a fashionable new look at a fraction of the price.
"Women in the early 1800s wore their bonnets and dresses for many, many years, but updated them regularly," notes OSV historian Victoria Belisle. "Feathers, flowers and ribbons on bonnets were designed to be changed. Adding an undulating plume or swapping the silk flowers gave the bonnet wearer a whole new look."
Clothes were an investment, and mending was an art, Belisle adds. "There was no shame in mending and patching – as long as it was done well. For example, if you had a nice black ball gown, but the elbows were starting to lose their color or 'get rusty,' you simply removed the sleeve and turned it around so that the worn part was hidden on the inside."
When fashion silhouettes changed from the high-waist empire style to dresses with lower, natural waistlines in the 1820s and 1830s, many women simply added a fashionable wide belt to older dresses to camouflage the difference. Women also updated dresses by taking old ones apart, using the bodice as a pattern for a new dress and repurposing the skirt as a petticoat.
Rural New England women kept up with fashion trends through letters from city dwelling friends and relatives, and used illustrations in fashion magazines like Godey's Ladies Book for inspiration. Sewing required creativity, but also skill in mathematics and geometry to enlarge and interpret small patterns and diagrams.
Old Sturbridge Village celebrates New England life in the 1830s and is one of the largest living history museums in the country. The museum is open daily 9:30 a.m. – 5:00 p.m. seven days a week. OSV offers free parking and a free return visit within 10 days. For times and details of all OSV activities visit: www.osv.org or call 1-800-SEE-1830.
