Visual Materials

Subseries C. Fashion Plates and Periodicals (small size)

Description: Includes periodicals, fashion plates, separated pages, and clippings from American and European fashion and women's magazines and related business entities.
Type: Visual Materials(Opens in new tab)
Production date: approximately 1577-1943.
Call number: priJLC_FASH
Creator: Last, Jay T(Opens in new tab)
Provenance: Gift of Jay T. Last, 2005. This collection forms part of the Jay T. Last collection of graphic arts and social history, which was donated to the Huntington Library by Jay T. Last in 2005 as a gift in progress.
Restrictions

Subseries C. Fashion Plates and Periodicals (large size)

Visual Materials

This subseries contains over 120 printed illustrations of American and French fashion trends dating from the 1830s to the early 1900s. These images, commonly known as "fashion plates," typically depict men, women, or children modeling current clothing styles. Larger plates (larger than 14 x 10 inches in this collection), primarily intended for display, advertised the products and services of fashion designers, tailors, and pattern makers. For smaller plates (14 x 10 inches or less in this collection) see Series I, Subseries C. The collection features 42 plates by Genio C. Scott dating from 1841 to 1876, 28 plates of E. Butterick & Co. dating from 1867 to 1886, and 23 plates from the French fashion magazine La Mode Illustrée dating from 1872 to 1886. The oldest fashion plate is an 1832 print from New York City tailor A. F. Saguezs. The plates contain predominantly uncolored or hand-colored images. This material provides a resource for studying changing fashion trends in the United States and France in the 19th century. Among the changes reflected, men's fashions saw transitions from pantaloons to trousers and cravats to neck ties. Frock coats for day and tail coats for evening were very popular for much of the period. For women, a wide variety of styles, trends, and clothing items are represented, including gigot sleeves, wide full skirts, bustled and draped dresses, fitted bodices, riding habits, outerwear, and various hats, bonnets, and headdresses.

priJLC_FASH

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Plates and Periodicals: American and European, A-O by company (8 x 10 inches or smaller in size)

Visual Materials

The Jay T. Last collection of fashion prints and ephemera contains approximately 7,500 items dating from the 1570s to the early 1900s, with the bulk of the items spanning from 1825 to 1900. This collection consists of fashion plates, advertising prints, broadsides, and promotional ephemera produced for clothiers and tailors, dry goods suppliers, garment manufacturers, fashion publications, and textile companies affiliated with the design, production, and/or sale of clothing, accessories, and dry goods. While most of the materials are American, there are also notable quantities of foreign items in the collection, including French fashion plates, fez labels in several languages, and foreign textile labels. Labels affixed to textile samples of various sizes are also included. Materials are broadly divided into two series: small-size items (11 x 14 inches or smaller) and large-size items (typically larger than 11 x 14 inches). Small-size items are described broadly at the series level; large-size items and select small-size items are fully inventoried with printers, artists, and publishers indexed by name. The collection includes 250 large-size items comprised mainly of lithographic advertising prints and fashion plates. Small-size items number approximately 7,250 and contain a variety of promotional materials including trade cards, calendars, booklets, product labels, fashion plates, periodicals, clippings, and printed billheads and letterheads with manuscript text. Each series is divided into subseries according to the kind of business, service, or trade sponsoring the advertisement. Types of businesses have been identified according to the principal type of product(s) manufactured or sold by the business. These subseries are arranged as follows: Accessories; Clothiers, Tailors, and Dry Goods; Fashion Plates And Periodicals; Footwear; Garments; Headwear; Sewing Supplies; and Textiles. This collection contains many American and European printed illustrations, commonly known as "fashion plates," that typically depict men, women, or children modeling current clothing and dress styles. Small plates (usually 14 x 10 inches or less in this collection) illustrated the pages of magazines and bound volumes that were marketed specifically for women. Larger plates, primarily intended for display, advertised the products and services of fashion designers, tailors, and pattern makers. The collection provides a resource for studying clothing and dress, sales and merchandise, textiles, and sewing, as well as changing fashion trends in the United States and Europe in the 19th century. The images are primarily promotional in nature and provide information about the history of the American fashion, clothing, dry-goods, and textile industries and the evolution of their advertising strategies in the 19th and early 20th centuries. As graphic materials, the prints offer evidence of developing techniques and trends in printmaking, and of the artists, engravers, lithographers, printers, and publishers involved in the creative process.

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Subseries C. Fashion Plates and Periodicals (small size)

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Subseries C. Fashion Plates and Periodicals (large size)

Plates and Periodicals: American and European, A-O by company (8 x 10 inches or smaller in size)

Plates and Periodicals: American and European, P-Z by company, unidentified (8 x 10 inches or smaller in size)

Plates: Godey's Lady's Book(women) (8 x 10 inches or smaller in size)

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Plates: Miscellaneous (between 8 x 10 inches and 11 x 14 inches in size)