Victorian Influence on Women's Fashions

Before Research

Before the Victorian Era, the main focus of fashion was for men. Women’s’ fashion changed some, but the general idea of long skirts, tight bodices, and heavy fabrics stayed consistent. Real changes to style and fashion were not made until about the 1840’s, when Queen Victoria came into power. After her rise to Queen, the fashions began to change dramatically. Pride and Prejudice is a book written in this time, and the fashion is clearly visible. Looking at fashion of the time can be clear examples of social customs, role models, and other aspects of the time period.

The question to start off with is how has royalty affected women’s fashions through the ages? Royalty is influential on all sorts of things, so why not fashion? Another important question pertaining to the time is how women changed their style because of the emerging women’s right movement. What other things affected fashion? This was such a dramatic time period, and one can be certain that the changing fashions can parallel a changing culture. What events at this time could have sparked such a change? These are all things I hope to find out.

Victorian Fashion

To begin my research, I wanted to learn a little bit about the fashions and how they changed. I thought that this would be helpful, because if you don’t know what the fashions did, you won’t know if they were influenced at all. I learned that the Victorian Era’s fashion was divided up into multiple parts, consisting of the Pre-hoop, hoop, Early Bustle, Natural Form, Late Bustle, 1890’s, and Edwardian. Each part of the era strived for different looks and styles. The Pre-hoop era began in 1840, right after Queen Victoria took power. The features of this era include a long torso, low shoulders, and ...

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...gn. Her most influential contributions seem to be her wedding attire, and the mourning traditions she helped inspire. After looking at this research, is evident that Queen Victoria was just as influential for the typical wardrobe as she was over the rest of a common person’s daily life.

Works Cited

Delahunt, Jeannie. "Victorian Influence-Women's Fashions: 1860's." Suite. N.p., 06 10 2008. Web. 13 Feb 2014.

Rothman, Heather. "Mourning in the Victorian Era." . N.p.. Web. 6 Mar 2014.

"Queen Victoria’s wedding dress: the one that started it all."The Dreamstress. N.p., 18 04 2011. Web. 13

Sandeen, Del. "Victorian Fashion History." Love to Know. N.p.. Web. 13 Feb 2014.

"Victorian fashion." Wikipedia. N.p., 2 Mar 2014. Web. 11 Mar 2014.

"What is the Victorian Era?." Truly Victorian. N.p.. Web. 7 Feb 2014.

"White Wedding." Wikipedia. N.p., 10 02 2014. Web. 13 Feb 2014.