Silk Damask Dress
1740s/1780s
Style: In its original 1740s incarnation, this dress would have had an open-fronted bodice filled in by a stomacher, and quite possibly a matching petticoat (skirt). It was later altered to create the current closed-front bodice, any earlier trimmings have been removed, and the sleeves lengthened. Possibly fabric from an original petticoat was harvested to supply these changes.
Fabric: The Chinese silk fabric of this dress dates to the 1740s, but the dress has been remade in the style of the 1780s (and very likely had intermediate incarnations as well).
Dress, 3763, gift of Mary Mays Beatty, Ella England, and Ella Brynyate England; pink calamanco (glazed wool) petticoat, 59.35, worn in Waterville, Maine, gift of Lucy Ellis Riddell; linen kerchief, late 1700s, 84.4.12, gift of Henry Abbott; reproduction sleeve ruffles.
