Fashion in the period 1795-1820 in European and European-influenced countries saw the final triumph of undress or informal styles over the brocades, lace, periwigs, and powder of the earlier eighteenth century. In the aftermath of the French Revolution, no one in France wanted to appear to be an aristocrat, while in Britain, Beau Brummell introduced trousers, perfect tailoring, and unadorned, immaculate linen as the ideals of men's fashion.

Women's fashions followed classical ideals, and tightly laced corsets were temporarily abandoned in favor of a high-waisted, natural figure.

Women's fashion

In this period, fashionable women's clothing styles were based on the Empire silhouette — dresses were closely-fitted to the torso just under the breasts, falling loosely below. In different contexts, such styles are commonly called "Directoire" (referring to the Directory which ran France during the second half of the 1790s), "Empire" (referring to Napoleon's 1804-1814/1815 empire, and often also to his 1800-1804 "consulate"), or "Regency" (most precisely referring to the 1811-1820 period of George IV's formal regency, but often loosely used to refer to various periods between the 18th century and the Victorian).

These 1795-1820 fashions were quite different from the styles prevalent during the most of the rest of the 18th and 19th centuries, when women's clothes were generally tight against the torso from the natural waist upwards, and heavily full-skirted below (often inflated by means of hoop-skirts, crinolines, panniers, bustles, etc.). The high waistline of 1795-1820 styles took attention away from the natural waist, so that there was then no point to the tight "wasp-waist" corseting often considered fashionable during other periods. Thus during the 1795-1820 period, it was often possible for middle- and upper-class women to wear clothes that were not very confining or cumbersome, and still be considered decently and fashionably dressed.

Directoire (1795-1799)

By the early-to-mid 1790's, several influences had combined to produce a certain simplification in women's clothes: aspects of Englishwomen's practical country outdoors wear leaked upwards into high fashion, there was a reaction in revolutionary France against the ornately cumbersome aristocratic style of dress of the former royal regime (see 1750-1795 in fashion), and the aesthetic of Neo-classicism began to be applied (it was associated in France with ideas of ancient Athenian and Roman "republican virtue"). Waistlines became somewhat high by 1795, but skirts were still rather full, and neo-classical influences were not yet dominant.

It was during the second half of the 1790s that fashionable women in France began to adopt a thoroughgoing Classical style, based on an idealized version of ancient Greek and Roman dress (or what was thought at the time to be ancient Greek and Roman dress), with narrow clinging skirts. Some of the extreme Parisian versions of the neo-classical style (such as narrow straps which bared the shoulders, and dispensing with stays, petticoats, and shifts) were not widely adopted elsewhere, but many features of the late-1790s neo-classical style were broadly influential, surviving in progressively modified form in European fashions over the next two decades.

White was considered the most suitable color for neo-classical clothing (accessories were often in contrasting colors). Short trains trailing behind were common in dresses of the late 1790s.

Directoire gallery

1. of the Frankland sisters by John Hoppner gives an idea of the styles of 1795.
2. by William Blake. Blake is not a typical neo-classicist, but this shows a somewhat similar idealization of antiquity (as well as predicting the future high fashions of the late 1790's).
3. showing woman and girl wearing elegantly-simple high-waisted styles, which are not strongly neoclassical, however.
4. of Gabrielle Josephine du Pont.
5. , showing a lady who seems none too warmly attired for a balloon journey in her low-cut thin-looking directoire gown.
6. of white directoire gown worn with contrasting red shawl with Greek key border.
7. of a day outfit with short "spencer" jacket (less neo-classical, though still following the empire silhouette).

Caricatures

1. , a February 8th 1796 caricature engraved by Isaac Cruikshank (father of George) after a drawing by George M. Woodward. (In 1796, strongly neoclassically-influenced styles were still very new in England.) Notice the single vertical feather springing from the hair of the 1796 woman.
2. , an over-the-top caricature by Isaac Cruikshank of allegedly excessively diaphanous styles worn in late 1790's Paris.

Empire/Regency

to be written

Men's fashion

Overview

This period saw the final abandonment of lace, embroidery, and other embellishment from serious men's clothing — it would not reappear except as an affectation of the look in the .

Breeches became longer — tightly-fitted leather riding breeches reached almost to the boot tops — and were replaced by pantaloons or trousers for fashionable streetwear.

Coats were cutaway in front with long skirts or tails behind, and had tall standing collars.

Shirts had tall collars, worn turned up to the chin, and wrapped in a cravat tied in various fashions.

The rise of the dandy

The clothes-obsessed dandy first appeared in the 1790s, both in London and Paris. In the slang of the time, a dandy was differentiated from a fop in that the dandy's dress was more refined and sober.

Beau Brummell set the fashion for dandyism in British society from the mid-1790s, which was characterized by immaculate personal cleanliness, immaculate linen shirts with high collars, perfectly tied cravats, and exquisitely tailored plain dark coats.

Brummell abandoned his wig and cut his hair short in a Roman fashion dubbed à la Brutus echoing the fashion for all things classical seen in women's wear of this period. Brummell also led the move from breeches to snugly-tailored pantaloons or trousers, often light-colored for day and dark for evening, based on working-class clothing adopted by all classes in France in the wake of the Revolution.

Style gallery

1. Count Victor Kochubey's collar reaches his chin, and his cravat wrapped around his neck and tied in a small bow. His short hair is casually dressed and falls over his forehead.
2. , a satire on French fashions of 1810 - long tight breeches or pantaloons, short coats with tails, and massive cravats.
3. wears a double-breasted coat which shows a bit of the waistcoat beneath at the waist, tight pantaloons tucked into boots, and a high collar and cravat. 1816.

See also

• Dandy

References

Ashelford, Jane: The Art of Dress: Clothing and Society 1500-1914, Abrams, 1996. ISBN 0810963175

Baumgarten, Linda: What Clothes Reveal: The Language of Clothing in Colonial and Federal America, Yale University Press,2002. ISBN 0300095805

Black, J. Anderson and Madge Garland: A History of Fashion, Morrow, 1975. ISBN 0688028934

de Marly, Diana: Working Dress: A History of Occupational Clothing, Batsford (UK), 1986; Holmes & Meier (US), 1987. ISBN 0841911118

Payne, Blanche: History of Costume from the Ancient Egyptians to the Twentieth Century, Harper & Row, 1965. No ISBN for this edition; ASIN B0006BMNFS

Tozer, Jane and Sarah Levitt, Fabric of Society: A Century of People and their Clothes 1770-1870, Laura Ashley Press, ISBN 0950891304