Bodice, stays, stomacher

Stiffened bodice in two sections, with separate stomacher covered in flowered silk brocade. Blue silk tabby with a self-coloured lattice on which is a brocaded silk design of imaginary flowers. The scale suggests the date - there are roughly comparable silk designs in the Musée des Arts Décoratifs in Paris. The bodice is lined with a green furnishing damask. The tabs and the lining of the stomacher are light green taffeta, possibly a lustring. The silk is expensive - brocaded in silver as well as coloured silks but the whole garment is made from small pieces suggesting that it was made some time later either using scraps from a mantua maker or from a re-made garment. Pieced so no complete width of material or repeat in any direction. (Based on a catalogue note by Natalie Rothstein.)

Hodge-podge piecing of silk damask over a fully boned foundation using quite rough, crude stitching. The level of crudeness in the stitching and piecing of the silk suggests this may have been done for fancy dress, not actual wear. The left-hand back edge stitching has come partly undone and shows there is a darker blue silk brocade underneath the current one – it appears that an older, original bodice/stays has been re-covered with scraps or pieces of the lighter blue brocade. The linings are also replacements; the shoulder straps are pieced at the front and the ends overlap underneath the silk brocade – a bit of the darker blue brocade is visible at this point inside the right-hand half of the stays. The stomacher covering is also crudely pieced and bound top and bottom with bias strips of the silk brocade (not an 18th c technique). There are lumps of some manner of stuffing in the stomacher – one at the top/bust, another in the middle (appears to have slipped down) and at the very bottom – these suggest to be for bust enhancement. There is what looks to be a little bit of machine sewing in the lining of the right-hand half. (Based on examination notes by Carolyn Dowdell, 2012/13.)