Historical Perspective on Elizabeth

[Kathy Henning]

Welcome to the board and I look forward to learning more about this time in history. Thanks for all of the information that you have shared. You may become our on board Felicity and Elizabeth teacher!

[dolldreamer]

wow! I love you!! I am eating up your posts! Thanks for all the information. It is making me even more excited for her release. If only they hadn't changed her coloring, then I would agree with you about them not barbie-ing her up.
But I can't wait to see eveything.
Now, would they have had a pink riding outfit? Felicity's is green, and I think elizabthe's is supposed to be pink. Is that acurate? Wouldn't it get pretty dirty?

[AmericanGirlLover2982]

Welcome to the board and thanks for your information.

Nikki [img]graemlins/rose.gif[/img]

[zap_sea]

Sorry it took a while but I have finally gotten around to answering MissMooMoo's question of sorts. Cloth was manufactured in England or even further abroad in places like India where printed cloth and silk came from. Dying was often done in the colonies especially by poorer folk who could purchase undyed fabric and then color it themselves with plants fom their gardens. For example, marigold petals make a very nice yellow. Often times you could tell someone's station by looking for slight variations in the color of their clothing. For example true red came from cochinel (sp?) bug which was ground up by hand and obviously took a lot more time to make and was therefore more expensive, maroon and deep reds came from the madder plant which was much more common. Clothing was generally manufactured in the colonies by the women of the house or professional tailors (who were mainly men.) But we are finding through research that there seemed to be a trade in ready made petticoats coming from England to the colonies. However these were mainly either embroidered or quilted which often denoted that someone with special skills would have to make them. During the revolutionary war many women made their own homespun cloth either out of patriotism or because the local merchants wouldn't sell British goods.

Thanks for the good question. At least I think it was a question. It didn't have a question mark. Oh well.

<font color="#051E50" size="1">[ July 30, 2005 01:08 AM: Message edited by: zap_sea ]</font>

[carolinapooh]

zap_sea, I think you have surpressed past lives rolling around in your psyche... [img]tongue.gif[/img]

In all seriousness - welcome to the board, and WOW - we're not bored with your posts at all! You are a very interesting person!

And you're making me see Elizabeth in a whole new light, too. But I still have to see her for myself.

Where did you find the pics of Felicity's new dress? I've been gone for a few days!

[zap_sea]

I could quite literally go on for hours about this stuff because I absolutely love it and I also love educating other people about it. I can't wait to see Elizabeth but I'm probably going to wait for the catalog. It will be so interesting to see the contrast between the dress of a an upper class girl (Elizabeth) and a middling sort girl (Lissie). I was really hoping that they would at least come out with the dress that you first meet Nellie in so that you could see the contrast between what Samantha wore and what the majority of girls wore but alas. I should probably start filling out that application to Colonial Williamsburg now. That is my dream job.

Oh, and you can find an illustration of her new meet dress (I'm assuming it's the cover of the book) in Kitzka's post, I'll try to put it up at the top. Thanks for saying I'm interesting.

<font color="#051E50" size="1">[ July 30, 2005 01:10 AM: Message edited by: zap_sea ]</font>

[zap_sea]

Wow! I so great to see that people are really interested in what I have to say. I can't wait to see all the new stuff so I can comment on that.

To answer dolldreamer's question, they did wear pink riding habits (you can see a beautiful one
here if you enlarge the photo at the top.) I also knew a women who had a lovely pink one that she made. However, I believe Elizabeth's is going to be blue. Colonial women would also not have worried about it getting dirty because riding habits were almost exclusively worn by the very rich so a litle dirt could have been very easily taken care of. Colonial women wore riding habits for walking, riding, and visiting. I believe that Felicity's granfather gives one to her so that would explain a girl of middling class having one but it's been a while since I read the books.

As an interesting side story about riding habits, during the battle of Boston a number of high ranking officer's wives including Martha Washington came to Cambridge, Mass. One of them was Elizabeth Gates, the wife of General Horatio Gates who was a British officer who sided with the colonists. She proceeded to cause "something of a sensation, going about Cambridge in a mannish English riding habit." (That was a quote from '1776' by david McCullough, an excellent book that I highly reccomend.)

Thank you for reading this and if anybody else has anymore questions I would be happy to answer them.

<font color="#051E50" size="1">[ July 30, 2005 02:31 PM: Message edited by: zap_sea ]</font>

[Grapedy1982]

Welcome to the board! Now we just about have every period covered in regards to fashion history. I work at an Empire-era plantation, so I find everything about Josefina to be fascinating.

I'm very interested in seeing what the other new clothes for Lissie and Elizabeth look like. The purple "ribbon" that comes with the traveling gown is kinda stretchy and it resembles a wedding garter. It's very pretty.

I do know that print-wise and style-wise, the traveling gown is rather accurate for the time period. It's the fabric choice that I have problems with. It feels like fake polyester tafetta, and looks like fake polyester tafetta, minus the color variations inherent to tafetta. If they had chosen a cotton to do it in I'd be much happier. I do love the embroidered flowers on it, and the mob cap.

[Kaileyfan1]

Welcome to the board!!!!

[lscogbill]

What I find most odd about the traveling gown/new meet dress is that the embroidered flowers are only on the front. I do find it to be a very lovely dress though. Is that historically accurate, or would the embroidery have been all over?