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Modjeska
Biography
Queen of a modern publicity
Costumes
Costumes and dresses
Teaching of the Art of Women's Tailoring
Lingerie
INSPIRATIONS: Photo Gallery
RECONSTRUCTIONS: Description of Dresses and Patterns
Crinoline for the role of Barbara Radziwiłł (1865)
Crinoline with velvet ribbons (1865)
Crinoline in stripes (1868)
Crinoline with meanders (1869)
Riding Habit (1870)
Bustle ball gown - one (1871)
Bustle ball gown - two (1871)
Mary Stuart (1872)
Princess style with flowers (1878)
Julia (1878)
Cleopatra (1880)
Princess style with fur (1880)
Princess style black and white (1882)
Bustle gown with tassels (1884)
White bustle (1885)
Bustle with saber (1886)
Beaded ball dress (1891)
Art nouveau with buttons (1898)
Swimsuit (1900)
Classic art nouveau (1903)
Lingerie 1860 – 1910
Characteristic for the 19th century were frequent changes of female silhouette. Beginnings are humble with Empire period dress-skirt. Later dress becomes more sophisticated. Entering Biedermeier period it is being enriched with new elements, majestically transformed into a crinoline, which then is reduced to a bustle only a while later to get rid of it as well creating slim princes-style form. This also did not last for long – bustle was back albeit in a modified form. With the disappearance of this frame, for a change, the top side of the silhouette swells in sleeves only to transform smoothly into a Art Nouveau woman-flower figure. Fatigue with decorativeness leads dress straight to the twentieth-century simplicity of Art Deco. All those changes required proper lingerie, which would enable a fashionable effect.
Helena Modjeska well knew how to adapt to these changes, while highlighting all the advantages of her figure. She was one of the best dressed women of her time, regardless of whether at given time she had money for clothes or not. Because she could sew, working her magic to create a new outfit did not take much time. She also got her dresses from Parisian tailors. She could enchant people with her acting, personality, and with her clothes.
We will acquaint ourselves with the kind of Modjeska clothes, about which it was not proper to talk, although it was a part of wardrobe of any contemporary woman – with lingerie.
Shirt was the basic. This proverbially [in Polish] „close to the flesh” shirt was usually knee length. Corselet (top half of the shirt) was as a rule decorated. There was a choice of embroidery, pleats, frills, laces, etc. Sometimes a couple of elements were used simultaneously, it all depended on material status and diligence of the owner. Patterns for lingerie “garnish” (decoration, ornamentation) were provided by fashion magazines of that time. Shirt was creased over the bust. Neckline was wide and usually tightened with a cord. For a daytime version tightened cord decreased décolletage and when wearing with a ball gown it was released so that it would not be visible from under the dress with a low neckline. Often, especially for dowry, there were sets containing shirt, panties, bodice and sometimes also “white dress” (petticoat) all with the same type of decoration.
The second thing that was worn, were panties. Actually there were two separate legs joined by the strap. The strap was smooth from the front, not to unduly widen the waist, back was being tightened with a cord, adjusting to the waist. Generally the strap was not being decorated but bottom part of the legs were. Most of the time a shirt was put into the pants, which was reflected in garnishing – it was not worthy to decorate something that was concealed. Visible parts were corselet and shirt’s sleeves, bottom part of pants, neckline and sleeves of the bodice. However, there were sometimes shirts decorated at the bottom (chemise-jupon), then panties were worn underneath. In the 1850s so called combination appears or a set of shirt and panties (this was the dress with the flap at the back!). We do not know whether it was part of Modjeska’s wardrobe.
Another element is corset – it emphasizes hips, squeezes waist, lifts up a bust. During this period, corsets were quite short. For corset "not to hurt" a dress, as well as another layer protecting dress from sweat, a bodice was worn. During winter an additional skirt, usually made of warm flannel, rather short and narrow was worn. It was being put on before crinoline and was meant to warm up the user. Crinoline in its 19th century version was invented in 1855. Modjeska was then 15 years old. Since her childhood, she closely watched the world of fashion, she learned to sew. These experiences will have a significant impact on her subsequent way of life and way of dressing. Previously, also some frames were worn, but they differed from crinoline more then by name alone. Nineteenth-century crinoline underwent several times a change of its shape. The first change was the result of preceding fashion - from the 1840s , the volume of the bottom of the dress increases, in the mid 1850s to keep appropriate form of dress a couple of starched skirts are being put on. These petticoats evenly widened silhouette all around. The first crinoline had a domed shape. In the years 1858-1859 its perimeter at the bottom is already very large. In magazines frequently one could find announcements of the reduction of the circumference of the "cage" or of its complete rejection. Its decline in such a shape falls at about 1862-1863, because already in 1860 modifications of its form started. Crinoline began to be flattened from the front and gently enlarge on the rear. Gradually it again started to increase its circumference to reach its apogee in the years 1865-1866 – with a flat front, it ranged widely on the back behind the owner.
On one of the photographs Modjeska appears wearing walking crinoline, with reduced circumference and significantly shortened.
Petticoat was worn over the crinoline. Firstly, so that the rods of the steel frame would not be visibly marked on the dress. Secondly, to arrange well the dress. Thirdly, in the case of thin fabric dresses, so that one could not see crinoline. Sometimes it was so called ‘bottom skirt’, visible from under top skirt when going out to the street.
Since 1868, crinoline was quite often experimented with. Elevations were added on sides, so as to resemble rococo pannier, at other times frame was being elevated at the rear for a better lying of folds, then it was abandoned again. Gradually, however, its circumference at the bottom was being reduced, so that ultimately it consisted only of a few not particularly broad bottom rims, hanging on tapes. Ultimately, the battle for a new shape of silhouette had been won by the bustle. It appeared in several varieties: as crinoline with added permanently frame raising the rear, as a set of two pieces worn together – a small crinoline and a bustle, or in humblest version - a bustle worn with a petticoat.
Shirt, pantaloons, corselet remain unchanged, they preserve a very similar patterns to those from the age of crinoline. Along with the pattern of skirt also pattern of petticoat changes - front and side gores are triangular with a strongly expanded bottom and a back gore has a form of rectangle, strongly creased at the top.
Since 1875 bustle is being reduced, and eventually it is abandoned in favor of tight princes-style dress. Rear gore of the skirt was tightened at knee length, while its bottom expanded like fan to form so beloved at this time train (the most fashionable was in the form of a "dove tail"). Of course not every woman could boast a perfect figure, or felt comfortable with "indecently" tight style of the princes style dress, which meant that sometimes a rudimentary form bustle was being used. In general, however, instead of it a suitable petticoat was worn.
Rest of the lingerie had also changed. Shirts were richly decorated, but were not so wide and so strongly crinkled at corselet. Tightness of dresses forced pants to be narrower. Combinations of pants and shirt or shirt and petticoat were used more frequently.
Petticoat had been transformed as well .At the waist it had to stick to the figure so it was sewn from narrow gores or with a wide neck, and around the bottom there was a flounce often richly decorated which was supposed to help top skirt to lay well. Frequently it was possible to attach a train to the petticoat so as to protect the tail of the top skirt from dust and dirt of streets.
The shape of corset had also changed. Crinoline was expanding silhouette from the waist down, so it was important to squeeze the top of figure. In the tight dresses of 1875-1882 also hips were supposed to have a beautiful shape and accordingly corset had been extended.
Modjeska was often photographed in a dress with such a tight line, and no wonder, since she looked in them great, of what she was anyway perfectly aware.
Since 1880 short skirts without train appear much more frequently. Fatigue with narrow fashion slowly sets in and bustle is back in 1882. It differs from its predecessor by the way in which it is supposed to influences shape of woman's silhouette. First bustle came from crinoline - skirts and petticoats were cut from gores, narrow at the top, wide at the bottom, which evenly widened the dress downwards. Second bustle came from the narrow fashion of princes style dress, so skirt was cut from gores which only slightly widened towards bottom. Front and back of silhouettes were narrow, but when one looked at it from the side, rear took on the shape of a shelf. Reminder of lingerie did not change much.
Helena Modjeska did not like the second bustle. She never wore a large frame under her dress, she preferred a smaller, which did not deformed silhouette to such an extent.
Like every other thing in fashion, bustle too became boring. It finally disappeared in 1890. For several years feminine silhouette had almost natural shape. But at the bottom skirt began to expand again, and sleeves at the top. Silhouette from 1895 already has a bell-shaped round skirt (and thus, same petticoat with a frill at the bottom), and big puffy sleeves. Fashion enforces on women a narrow waist and a new shape of corset was emphasizing it. The general widening of the top half of the silhouette results in a big bust becoming trendy. First "bras" appear or rather frames enlarging bust, sort of today’s push up bras. Shirts have – like never before - wide ruffles at a neckline.
At the same time feminists call for a reform of the dress. Reformed dress appears, loose, usually cut under the bust. With it comes suitable lingerie – a loose shirt, loose combination. Even corset underwent reform or even, horror of horrors, it was sometimes abandoned altogether. This kind of outfit has gained popularity as a casual, house dress.
Helena Modjeska had such dresses in her wardrobe, photos show her in the privacy of her home, and we can assume that she wore them with the appropriate lingerie.
There is another change at the turn of the century. Sleeves are losing huge puffs, bodice gets "wasp abdomen," and skirt tightly enwraps hips. Skirts - and petticoats - again are cut from gores, tight at the waist and hips they are expanding only above the knee and are globed around the feet. Not only a petticoat changes, but also a corselet. Like the dress, it also gains a "wasp abdomen". Corset bends woman's body to form a fashionable S-shaped silhouette: it pushes forward bust, clutches the waist, and moves hips to the rear.
Unfortunately, Modjeska did not live long enough to see the times when Art Deco simplicity reigned in fashion. We would never see how her sense for fashion adapts to those new times. It remains for us to watch the old photographs and dream about putting on, be it for a moment, one of her dresses, feeling wearing all of those layers, corset and frame. Feeling even just for a moment like a woman of that time, feeling like Modjeska, icon of style.
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