Dress

Salmon pink ribbed silk sack-backed gown with elbow length sleeves. Bodice and sleeves lined in linen. Fitted open bodice with stomacher sewn in. Stomacher laced down centre front and fastens to the bodice on one side with hooks; there are two rows of fastenings for the hooks on bodice for adjustment. Bodice back supported by linen under-structure which is tied to keep shape of bodice. Double scalloped cuffs short in the front, long at the back, edged in braid and with ruching at the sleeve end. Robings on the bodice and skirt with ruched decoration, Low squared neckline with two large double box pleats at the back sewn down to waist level. Skirt pleated into waistband with pocket openings and trained. Front of skirts decorated with serpentine furbelows and metal tassels. Buttons in the same fabric on the back inside of skirt and at the side pocket openings may have been used to catch the skirt up. Gown has been altered on the armhole.
Catalogue note by Natalie Rothstein. Plain corded silk of a colour popular in the 1820s and 1830s. It is a very heavy silk and the trimming looks pseudo rather than genuinely C18. The selvage also looks more like a C19 one.