QUILTS & FABRIC: PAST & PRESENT


Sunday, November 3, 2019

Furniture Chintz---Fashion Chintz


Periodically, fashion dictates that furniture chintz
is the perfect fabric for a dress.

1960 ???


 Netherlands, 17th century

And France in the 18th

Madame Pompadour


Pucci in the 1970s

French 1850s
Philadelphia Museum of Art

Much of this large scale floral fabric is silk and the truly elegant stuff is woven into patterns or embroidered with the pattern.

Dress worn by Queen Victoria in 1855.
Museum of the City of London

But prints have always been an inexpensive copy of woven pattern


Deborah Sampson's dress
Historic New England

Painting from the Index of American Design

Alexandra of Denmark engaged to England's Prince Edward
1860s

France's Empress Eugenie set fashion. She always had the widest skirts.
Eugenie's bodice on a reproduction skirt

Eugenie in 1858


Mary Lincoln liked to think she was the American
Empress

Two portraits of the First Lady from the early 1860s



Oswego, New York



Is that a bird print in the border of this skirt?

Christian Dior

Nice outfit!

7 comments:

  1. So Scarlett OHara was not so nuts in making a dress out of the curtains! There is/was a precedent.

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  2. Thank you, I enjoyed all the pics & prints! You've got to have a server just for the pics. Great post.

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  3. Perfect for the job! Beautiful dresses. Not sure about the ruffles though - a tad over the top?
    Years ago a carpet company over here (Brintons) used to advertise with crinolines and other designs all made from carpet. I doubt they had the flexibility though! I also doubt that the carpet could be worn but set on a frame for the model to stand behind, or inside.

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  4. Love this, and the reference to Scarlett. Make sure to check out the spoof on that movie as a sketch on the Carol Burnet show, find it on You tube. LOL!

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  5. Chintz is technically the fiber, right? (Glazed cotton.) The big splashy flowers are just a type of pattern....The danger of using upholstery or drapery goods for a garment is that those very flowers are not always placed to flatter one's figure....That said, one of my favorite summer shirts is made from a piece of garment linen printed with big (well, big-ish) flowers. I got the fabric on Nantucket back in 2003, made the shirt in 2006, and I still love it.

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  6. Thank you for sharing such a wonderful post. I love it so much.Office Furniture

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