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Kitty Calash

~ Confessions of a Known Bonnet-Wearer

Kitty Calash

Tag Archives: millinery

A Bonnet, Universally Acknowledged

11 Monday Feb 2019

Posted by kittycalash in Clothing, History, Living History, material culture, Reenacting, Research

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Tags

1770s, 18th century clothes, American Revolution, authenticity, bonnets, Boston, living history, millinery, Research

Print made by James Caldwall, 1739–1819, British, A Ladies Maid Purchasing a Leek, 1772, Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Collection

“It is a truth universally acknowledged that if a bonnet existed in the 1770s, it was black taffeta” has long been the rule reenactors have followed, particularly those wanting to adhere to the strictest standards of well-researched impressions based on primary source documents and period material culture. Truth examined is more subtle, showing that bonnet colours, materials, and shapes varied from decade to decade—and year to year—and that these factors seem to have varied by region. What worked in Boston would not be comfortable in the Carolinas, and people adjusted accordingly.

I was asked recently about Boston-area bonnets in the first half of the 1770s. My impression of this decade is that it is one in which there is a stylistic change in women’s headwear, as the “sunshade”* and “Bath” bonnet terms fade from use, giving way to plain “bonnet” or “chip” bonnets. These appear to have been made from “bonnet paper,” seen in both blue and white** in newspaper ads, though prints and paintings show brims in both boned and paper forms.

The Rival Milleners. Mezzotint after John Collet, 1772. Colonial Williamsburg Foundation, 1955-125

Brim shape and bonnet material— fabric and colour–  vary by period (and region). So let’s look at Boston in the first years of the 1770s. One tricky bit is that there are fewer indentured servants and enslaved people in Boston than elsewhere in the American Colonies in this period, so runaway ads are scarce, giving us fewer clues than we get in Pennsylvania and points south. Still, there are plenty of ads to help guide us.

As early as 1769, we see color variations, with the mention of “black, blue, green, white, and crimson bonnets” in Caleb Blanchard’s store. The year before, Joshua Gardner and Company advertised “black, pink, blue & crimson sattin hats and bonnets.” That means that on the streets of Boston and environs, by 1775, you’d see half-worn black, blue, green, white, crimson and pink satin bonnets.

The best statistics around for bonnets are currently tabulated for Pennsylvania, and definitely show the preponderance of bonnets are black (52 of 75 tabulated, or 69%). So don’t give up on black silk bonnets! They are the most common color. If we extrapolate these statistics, for a Pennsylvania event in the 1770s, of every 10 bonnets, seven should be black, one should be white, one should be green, and one should be blue. In larger groups, we’d also see red and brown bonnets, but again, just one in 20 or 30.

The Boston Gazette, April 4, 1774. Benjamin Franklin’s sister advertises “Sattins of the newest Fashion… for Bonnets.”

“A few sarsnet taffety bonnets,” in the Boston Evening Post, September 28, 1772.

For Massachusetts, statistics are more difficult to compile, given the dearth of runaway ads and the fact that I haven’t yet dived into inventory and probate records. Merchants’ ads give us some clues as to materials, and one thing I find is that “sattin” shows up, as well as “sarsnet taffety” or pelong. Sarsnet or sarcenet was a “think transparent silk of plain weave,” according to Textiles in America. Thicker than Persian, sarcenet was woven both plain and twill, and could be plain or changeable. Pelong is a kind of silk satin, again according to Textiles in America, and in The Dictionary of Fashion History, described as a kind of “thin silk satin,” but I have also seen it described as a ribbed silk. Joshua Blanchard advertised “Pelong sattins of all colours” in 1768. Where does that leave us with materials? Probably with the need for more bonnets to be made of silk satin than of silk taffeta, though the proportions are difficult to calculate yet.

Miss Theophila Palmer (1757-1848), oil on canvas, attributed to Sir Joshua Reynolds ca 1770.

What about shape? For those dressing a la mode, we are past the deep-brimmed, small-cauled “lampshade” of the 1760s, and into a smaller, tighter bonnet with a larger caul and more trimming. In the portrait of Miss Palmer, we see how the brim stands away from the face, and the caul or crown poufs up. “A Lady’s Maid Purchasing a Leek” and “The Rival Milleners” (aee above) both depict women in similarly tight-brimmed and round-crowned bonnets trimmed with bows. These are shapes that I am confident appeared almost universally (with variations) in the American colonies in the first years of the 1770s. Now, there are different shapes to be sure, but these seem to predominate. I do think we need to see more brims that wrap around the head, as seen in the 1774 mezzotint of George Whitefield (Anglo-America’s most popular preacher) and his followers.

Detail, A Call to the Converted. Publish’d April 15, 1774, by W. Humphry . Lewis Walpole Library, 774.04.15.01+

So what’s the take away, if we are looking specifically at Boston and environs in the first half of the 1770s?

  1. Most bonnets (70%) were black, but a few white, green, crimson, and blue were seen.
  2. Most bonnets were made of silk satin, with others of taffeta or sarsnet (sometimes twilled silk).
  3. Most bonnets would have a shorter, higher brim that curves across the face just above eye level, with a high, rounded crown/caul and bow trims.
  4. Bonnet brims would vary between bonnet (paste) board and boned

Each place has a local style– which, if you think about it, is still true today. When I stand on the Metro platform in the red wool coat I bought in Providence, these folks know I’m not from here. The way we dress for the past should reflect the place and the time we are representing as best we can. And that means we need accessories to match those times and places, as well as clothes.

And yes, full disclosure, I sell researched bonnets on Etsy. If you want a bonnet for a particular time and place, that’s what I make.

* Known on this blog as “lampshade”
** Nope, don’t know what that means yet, haven’t looked into it

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The Colour of Things to Come

28 Monday Jan 2019

Posted by kittycalash in Clothing, History, Living History, material culture, Reenacting, Research

≈ 4 Comments

Tags

18th century clothing, bonnets, Costume, fashion, French and Indian War, millinery, Research, Revolutionary War

I have a thing for hats– well, for bonnets, really. I know I made stays and a shift before I made anything else for the 18th century, but I might have made a bonnet before I made a proper gown. It’s a condition I inherited from my grandmother, and a great aunt who was a milliner, so there’s little to be done about it– except to dive in deeper.

Miss Theophila Palmer (1757-1848), oil on canvas, attributed to Sir Joshua Reynolds ca 1770. Pretty sure that’s a white “whalebone” or “skeleton” bonnet.

As people do more research and generously share it with me, I’ve come to realize that I need to synthesize what we are seeing. It’s a tricky thing, what with that single (known) extant bonnet at Colonial Williamsburg and only prints and images to go on. What I’ve done to compile a stack of references from newspaper ads (primarily Mid-Atlantic and New England colonies at the moment) and interfiled them with images. This has given me a much better sense of  the change in shapes and construction over time, as well as the range of colours– yes, colours, available and popular.

It’s not just that wool bonnets are a thing– there’s the ““a reddish coloured worsted bonnet” in the April 8, 1776 Pennsylvania Packet an ad for runaway Margaret Collands, and the “black durant” recommended in Instructions for Cutting Out Apparel for the Poor– but close reading shows that the colors are more varied than we’ve accept lately, but they vary by region and time period.

The Misses Waldegrave. Are blue bonnets *only* for children? Maybe.

There’s been a rule that “all bonnets are black silk,” which is too broad a statement. Most bonnets are black, that’s true. But in 1768, in Boston, a place where folks would have you think that black is the only colour bonnet you can ever have, you can have “Black, pink, blue and crimson sattin hatts and bonnets” (Joshua Gardner and Com. ad, Boston News-Letter, November 24, 1768).

Heck, if you shopped at Caleb Blanchard, you could have a green bonnet, too! Blanchard advertised “black, blue, green, white and crimson Sattin bonnets” in the Boston Gazette on December 18, 1769.

screen shot 2019-01-26 at 6.56.33 am
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What does this mean? My SWAG is that roughly 60-70% of bonnets should be black. After that, blue, white, red and green would make up the balance. In Philadelphia, green bonnets– and green flowered bonnets– last longer in the ads. Philadelphia is also where I see more white bonnets, a brown silk bonnet, a diaper bonnet, a “queen’s grey” bonnet, and, in Trenton, a “lye coloured” bonnet. In Rhode Island, there’s a blue stuff bonnet. So yes, bonnets should mostly be black. But they can also be other colours.

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Hoods and Caps and Bonnets, oh my!

07 Monday Jan 2019

Posted by kittycalash in Living History, Making Things, material culture, Research

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

18th century clothing, common dress, Etsy, hoods, millinery, winter

Griselda Countess Stanhope. Mezzotint engraving by James McArdell after Allen Ramsay. British Museum, ca 1760

Let’s take a closer look at Griselda, Countess Stanhope. She wears a hood over a fine white cap, as well as a hooded cloak. Around her neck, she wears a fur tippet, and her hands are snuggled into a muff. While most of the “common” women in the colonies wouldn’t rise to the Countess’s ermine tippet, they did have hoods.

Thomas Howe Ridgate’s inventory taken 19 June 1790 in Charles County Maryland includes “3 velvet and silk hoods,” while Mrs. Elizabeth Lawson’s inventory, taken 3 May 1766 in Prince Georges County Maryland includes one velvet hood and one “Allamod” hood. (She also has “1 old Striped Bonnet,” as well as 2 Womens New Capes, and 1 Womans Life everlasting Petticoat, which bears further investigation.)

Hoods appear fairly regularly in prints, worn over caps (as in Countess Stanhope), under hats, and even under bonnets, as in this print from the Victoria & Albert Museum.

January, engraving, ca. 1780. E.3520-1953. Victoria & Albert Museum

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The mantelet hood worn over the bonnet, hood, and cap layers.

In the images above, I’m wearing a white cap, black silk hood, and black “stuff” bonnet, with a black silk mantlet over a silk neck-handkerchief. The hood needs some tweaking, size-wise, but the layers definitely recreate what we see in the print of “January.” The bonnet has an adjustable caul, so will easily fit over hair, cap, and hood; the hood has a drawstring closure at the neck that helps keep out the wind. Taken altogether, these layers are definitely insulating! Looking like an 18th century engraving is almost a bonus– but when you wear what they wore, you look like they did.

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Capote de Velour garnis en satin

27 Tuesday Nov 2018

Posted by kittycalash in Clothing, Making Things

≈ 5 Comments

Tags

19th century, bonnets, fashion plate, Federal style, handsewn, Jane Austen, millinery, Regency

Costumes Parisiens, 1807

This plate has stuck with me for years: those mailbox shapes, in velour! In 1807, velour was not what we think of today (and I don’t mean Zapp Branigan). Valerie Cumming’s Dictionary of Fashion defines velour as “Wool or wool mixture cloth, soft and smooth with a closely-cut pile or nap resembling velvet.” Not having access to wool velour in the scrap bins at work, or in the fashion aisles at the local fabric store, I opted for velvet; the scrap bin provided pink silk taffeta, which I thought made a nice contrast to the texture and finish of the velvet. It is true that “velure” dates to the 17th century, and describes imitation velvet. The wool velour I’m familiar with from upholstery is too dense and heavy to drape well over a bonnet (it’s really made for sofas and armchairs), so erring on the hand of the fabric seemed a reasonable choice. Wool velour with silk satin would be an amazing textural contrast, but with this color combination, almost any fabrics will give a pleasant optical shock.

French 19th Century, Les Invisibles en tête-à-tête (Tête-à-Tête with Poke Bonnets), c. 1805, etching with publisher’s hand coloring in watercolor on pale green laid paper, Katharine Shepard Fund 2015.49.4

Shaping the brim was an exercise in paper and pasteboard, winging it a bit until I achieved a length and width that was mailbox-like but not too drainage tunnel. The cartoons of the period make clear that these are deep brimmed bonnets. I do like that the bonnet on the left is trimmed so like the ones in the fashion plate; the one at right is probably corded or reeded, judging by the ridges.

The trickiest bit was shaping the silk to the compound curve of the brim. Three patternings got me there– until I realized the silk needed body to hold up to binding, and took a short cut. Ask not of the sin of fusible interfacing, for I have learned my lesson. Yes, the silk piece shrank and no longer curved evenly from the front edge. Thank goodness Drunk Tailor was watching The Pacific, so any foul language I may have used was disguised by movie dialogue. The binding is bias-cut silk, easy enough. After the debacle of the Vandyke trim, I opted not to cut and bind the leaf shapes, but rather to cut the ovals with pinking shears and attach them along a silk band. Would I do it differently another time? Possibly, if only because I like to imagine the different ways an American milliner might interpret a French fashion plate.

Once I settled on making the bonnet, I decided it was time to finish a pink wool petticoat I started in 2015 after a trip to Mood. It’s a tropical weight Australian wool, according to its selvedge, and has a high-waisted bodice with a drawstring closure. I covered the bottom drawstring (and added some bling) with a black velvet belt closed with a period paste buckle. (Every now and then someone doesn’t know what they’ve got, and lets it go for a price I can afford.) On top, the gathered back cotton velveteen canezou/Spencer made for my first trip to Genesee. Having a wardrobe extensive enough to mix-and-match almost the way I do from my modern closet is pretty satisfying, if a little crowded.

This isn’t a bonnet for wearing while crossing a busy street, though it will successfully shelter the wearer and a cat from any sudden downpours, and one is unlikely to get sunburned wearing this. I didn’t find it distracting to wear– but I didn’t go far, and I had a companion. But what price fashion?

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I Want [peppermint] Candy

10 Wednesday Oct 2018

Posted by kittycalash in Clothing, Living History, Making Things, material culture

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

18th century clothes, 18th century clothing, bonnets, cotton print, milliner, millinery, reproduction, wrapping gown

A friend regularly sends me bonnet descriptions from the inventories she’s researching; one description was of a white silk bonnet with a red cherry silk lining from Rowan County, N.C. in the 1770s. Hot stuff, right? Less hot if you made it in white linen, but even North Carolina has winter sometimes. I made two, of course, in sightly different shapes.

Bonnet Number One

Strawberry shortcake? Whipped cream and cherries? You tell me, but I always maintain that bonnets are the cupcakes of costuming: pretty, fluffy, low-calorie and quick to make. 

Once she’d sent me the description, I got hung up on finally finishing my wrapping gown. 

There are enough events where I sleep over that a wrapper for the morning is a useful thing. My characters don’t rate the silk of the one I made for Potts Grove Manor, but I used the same pattern with a reproduction cotton print from Burnley & Trowbridge. I love it– but I do feel a bit like a candy cane. 

Bonnet Number Two, Lampshade Style

Because I’ve seen so many instances of sun shade bonnet (herein known as “lampshade,” making one up in that form seemed like a good idea– and the crowning glory to the red and white striped wrapper. 

Now I really need a cherry red silk quilted petticoat to wear with this ensemble. Some other autumn, when I have more space and time perhaps. 

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#Maritime is the topic for Day 20 of #federalerafebruary, and how can I resist this fabulous piece on offer at Bernard and S. Dean Levy in New York. The eglomise glass ca, 1815 probably depicts “The Constitution and the Guerriere,” and this inventine dressing glass is probably from central Pennsylvania, Maryland, or northern Virginia. I have a weakness for tablet mirrors and dressing glasses, and this item fills both needs! http://ow.ly/p8Ar50lDhmJ #constitutionandguerriere #eglomise #dressingglass #mirror #mahoganyandyellowpine #thingsIwantbutcannothave #ogeefeet #shapedskirt

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