Description:
This boy’s printed wool dress is an important example of children's clothing worn in the Connecticut River Valley during the mid-late 19th-century. It was worn by George Lincoln Hawley (b.1863) of Farmington, Connecticut. The dress is constructed as one piece and fastens at the center back bodice, with a placket extending into the gathered skirt. Despite the introduction of the sewing machine in the early 1840s, this garment is entirely stitched by hand, illustrating the gradual intergration of technology into clothesmaking. The dress is made from a wool printed with an all-over design of white circles outlined in black with a black dot inside, against a green ground. This printed fabric, which is slightly earlier than the garment, was printed by either the blotch, resist, or discharge method of dyeing. The garment features a wide, rounded neckline. The bodice is fitted by means of side seams and three pairs of vertical tucks or stitched down pleats at the front. Short sleeves trimmed with 2 double rows of black silk velvet trim. Full skirt gathered into the bodice at a natural waist seam. Skirt hem trimmed with 2 bands of the black silk velvet trim. Bodice is lined in an undyed plain weave cotton. The sleeves and skirt are unlined. The neckline is edged in an off-white silk binding or tape. The skirt hem is faced with a similarly printed green cotton. The center back fastens with 7 white ceramic buttons that have printed green decoration. A photograph exists of the wearer in the dress (2016.8.5). The photograph is identified as Waite, 275 Main Street, Hartford, Conn. For a similar garment in Historic Deerfield’s collection, see F.110. Hem circumference: 68.5” Waist level (from underarm): 5”
Link to share this object record:
https://museums.fivecolleges.edu/detail.php?t=objects&type=ext&id_number=HD+2016.8.1 |
