Name/Title
DressEntry/Object ID
w04589Description
HcD / w04589
Wedding Dress with jacket top
Blue silk, full skirt. Dated mid 1800.
Gift of Mr. & Mrs. Edward Soper, Castine, Maine 1967
Woman's dress, consisting of a separate bodice and skirt, made of blue shot silk, woven with blue threads in the warp and pale gray threads in the weft. The bodice has a round, band collar and a pointed waistline. The long sleeves have a narrow bell shape at the wrist and a cap at the shoulder. One of the sleeve caps retains its original trimming of two rows of blue silk braid.
The bodice front is fan-pleated into the point at the waist, with the fullness released at about waist level and spread out along the dropped shoulderline. The armscye and waistline seams are piped. Twill-woven brown cotton is used for the bodice lining; blue glazed cotton is used for the sleeve linings. Three darts on each side of the bodice front provide the bodice's fit; originally, the center front of the bodice, as well as the darts, side seams, and center back opening, were boned. (You can see where the edge binding was opened up to remove the boning, then restitched--not as well as the original stitching.)
The bust area is padded with wadding (a common feature in dresses of this period to create a smooth line over the corset. The proper right side seam of the bodice is pieced out with matching fabric, and is not an indication that the bodice has been made larger for a later wearer, but rather an indication that the maker miscalculated slightly when she cut the bodice pattern.
The dress is an interesting mixture of slightly old-fashioned 1840s style and up-to-date early 1850s style. While the bell sleeves are a feature of 1850s dress, the maker gathered the seam at the inside of the elbow, as was typically done with the tight 1840s sleeves to allow the wearer to bend her arm--not necessary with the flared 1850s style. The fan-pleated front of the bodice and extensive boning is also typically 1840s in style.
A separate skirt, however, is up-to-date 1850s style. The skirt is lined with blue glazed cotton. It has been altered by pleating it to a new white twill tape waistband. Originally, the waistband would have been of matching silk. The skirt has been made larger--its waist measures about 30 inches, while the bodice waist measures about 26 inches. There are old needleholes and a foldline indicating that it was originally cartridge-pleated to the waistband.
A handwritten fabric label stitched to the front of the bodice neckline reads: "Hcd '67 / Edward Soper.", lzb, 4/29/08.Interpretative Labels
Label Type
Cultural/Historical ContextLabel
This is an example of a luxury item that may have only been affordable to members of the merchant class.