whaaattt??

[jenthompson]

Okay, so I follow the FIDM blog, and I saw their posts about wedding dresses from the Larson Collection today. I usually don't question their facts, but what the hell is going on with the 2 Victorian dresses? Please educate me if I'm wrong, but those are not wedding dresses. The 60's one looks like a ball gown, and the 80's one looks like a

Comments

[atherleisure]

I don't know whether it was the case in America (or parts thereof) or anywhere else, but in England you couldn't get married after some particular hour of the day (noon, I think, though their definition of morning differed a bit from ours so the cutoff might not actually have been 12:00) during at least part of the Victorian period. I don't know when those laws may have changed, but it's definitely a plot device in novels of the period (sad bride having to leave the church because her bridegroom didn't show up in time...). So they definitely would have been wearing day dresses, not evening dresses.

I can't speak for Eastern Europe so I really don't have any opinion there. Perhaps it was an evening wedding and acceptable, perhaps not. Perhaps being a royal wedding changes the rules a bit. Perhaps it's not the gown worn for the church ceremony but some evening event associated with it. Pure speculation on my part. It's a gorgeous dress though.

[sisterofthemoon]

That 1869 wedding dress probably is a real wedding dress... there are some (not lots, but some) paintings, illustrations and photos out there of posh mid-victorian weddings in progress or the wedding party leaving the church or that have the bride in a low bodice even if no one else is, so I don't think there's reason to think all the ones we see extant today were all remade into evening dresses or there was another bodice actually used in the wedding that's now gone. It shows up in fashion plates and posed wedding photos as well, mostly 50s-early 70s. Obviously some are staged and not of a real event, but it was out there in the culture of the time

[jenthompson]

Fascinating! I had no idea that was a thing. Thanks for the info - I love learning new things!

[jenthompson]

BTW - I love that Unequal Marriage painting. I had never seen that one before. My mind is a little blown to see that sort of dress in front of an Orthodox priest. :) It's so rare that modern standards of modesty are stricter than Victorian ones!

[twe]

Yes, that is a fascinating painting, thanks for sharing!

[pinkdiamond]

there is a book on royal wedding dresses and yes, low ball gown bodices, full veils. Not only in single portraits but wide scenes of the whole wedding.

Royals were a whole different kettle of fish with coronations inside church so weddings too.

I got most of my pics offline, but all of Victoria's daughters. Victorias dress too,
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wedding_dress_of_Princess_Mary_of_Teck

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Wedding_of_George_V_of_the_United_Kingdom_and_Princesse_Mary_of_Teck
pretty irrefutable!
I think Alex's wedding was recorded in a similar fashion.

[pinkdiamond]

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Wedding_of_Edward_VII_of_the_United_Kingdom_and_Alexandra_of_Denmark
And there is one more I know of c1880

[pinkdiamond]

Victoria herself:
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Wedding_of_Victoria_and_Albert
I can't find the book online. Yet.

[jenthompson]

Thanks for telling me about these paintings! I actually love it when people can prove me wrong with new-to-me info! :)

[mrsmaupin]

Very interesting discussion ! I tend to be leery of accepting the "wedding dress" tag as so many people just accept the idea that white dress=bride or "my great-aunt said so so it's true". unless the provenance info is irrefutable or it's covered in orange blossoms, I stick with "it MAY have been a bridal dress.
I don't agree when they say white got "irrevocably associated with bridal wear" by the mid-19th century. White was worn for evening wear, too, way after 1850 !

[atherleisure]

And traditional graduation dresses (at least in the southern U.S.) were white, before the whole cap and gown thing...the Ursuline school in Dallas still uses them. The Dominican high school in Houston has white caps and gowns.

It's as bad as saying something is a mourning dress because it's black.

[isiswardrobe]

I agree with you. long sleeves for a wedding gown, but somewhere I read something of making the wedding gown with long sleeves only basted in for the ceremony, so it would be easy to make it into a ball gown after. And given how much people re-made clothes, it seems very likely.