In 1851, London celebrated the good Exhibition, showcasing the newest innovations in manufacture and style. Its warm reception by the general public and therefore the media confirmed, in many people’s eyes, the triumph of increased industrialization and production. However, some, who found this manner of life increasingly abhorrent, sought an alternative lifestyle by looking to the past.
Three years earlier, in 1848, the young artists William Hunt, John Everett Millais, and Dante Gabriel Rosetti established the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, taking inspiration from the art of the late medieval and early renaissance periods, which they felt produced a purer and more naturalistic style. The aesthetic female outfit has been a motif for almost all women since fashion came into being. If you want to buy one, you can visit DHgate.
As such, outfit played a crucial role within the depiction of the themes, but with no extant examples, references came from tomb effigies, illustrated manuscripts, and therefore the artist’s inventions. the sort of outfit that emerged was worn by female members of the artists’ circle.
Early sorts of the aesthetic outfit took the shape of flowing fabric with soft pleating falling from the neckline. The folds then gently gathered in at the natural, uncorseted waistline and fell into a little train at the rear. The sleeves were a defining feature; unlike those of fashionable outfits, they were set at the natural shoulder line and sometimes decorated with puffs of cloth at the sleeve head, or gathered down the length of the arm.
This enabled freedom of movement, as did the abandonment of the corset, which was felt to supply a more natural figure along the lines of the Venus de Milo, although critics noted: “had Venus herself been compelled by a chilly climate to drape herself, we’ve little doubt she would have worn stays, to offer her clothes the form they lacked”.
As such, the design found favor with outfit reformers who spoke out against the damaging effects of tightly laced corseting. the 2 movements became closely allied and by 1890 the Healthy and Artistic outfit Union was established, publishing their ideas in their journal Aglaia.
This telling quote also illustrates how the aesthetic outfit was now somewhat passé. Many of its elements had entered the mainstream, with the recognition of the dinner dress and therefore the ready availability of “artistic outfit” in most office stores.
A guide to London of 1889 recommends Hamilton’s of Regent Street for “those triumphs of needlework: smocked frocks and smocked tea gowns. But it’s by no means only in the so-called artistic outfit that they excel”.
By the turn of the century, the aesthetic outfit was not seen as radical or revolutionary. While its themes may have lingered within the work of early twentieth-century designers, like Mariano Fortuny, whose pleated fabrics seem directly inspired by the outfit worn in Rossetti’s painting.
A Vision of Fiametta (1878), or the draped velvets of Maria Monaci Gallenga, thesplendidsophisticatedsort of school had captured the artistic imagination, and therefore the soft muted colors and trailing drapery of aesthetic outfit were considered démodé.