Figure 1.--This quarter plate ambrotype shows two children whose dresses have been beautifully hand tinted. The ambrotype is housed in a half case with a geometric design. The children here sare unidentified. We know from the hair styles, however, that the younger child is a boy and the older child a girl. The portrait is undated, but was probanly taken in the late-1850s. We are unsure about the accuracy of the colors.

Color is a particularly difficult topic to address for 19th century clothing. Quite a few problems complicate out assessment of color. Much of the information we have gathered comes from our photographic archive. This provides information on patterns, but unfortunately the black and white photography of the day gives us few clues about color. Another problem is that been dresses were sewn at home. Thus catalogs are not as helpful as are the case with other garments. In addition catalogs are less available before the 1890s which was when dresses were more common for boys. There are of course other sources of information on color, including both paintaings and vintge clothing. We also have tined photographs, although we are less sure about the accuracy of the colors shown. The two colors we can identify with relative accuracy is white and black. White was particularly important for younger children. We see many American boys wsearing white dresses. A good example is 3-year old California boy, Carlton Gardner, we think in the 1880s.

Information Sources

Color is a particularly difficult topic to address for 19th century clothing. Quite a few problems complicate out assessment of color. Much of the information we have gathered comes from our photographic archive. This provides information on patterns, but unfortunately the black and white photography of the day gives us few clues about color. Another problem is that been dresses were sewn at home. Thus catalogs are not as helpful as are the case with other garments. In addition catalogs are less available before the 1890s which was when dresses were more common for boys. There are of course other sources of information on color, including both paintings and vintge clothing. We also have tined photographs, although we are less sure about the accuracy of the colors shown.

Color Shades

One interesting question in fashion is color. This is an important part of fashion and thevpopularity if different colors change over time. Unfortunately identifying colors in the black and white photography of the 19th century is a virtual impossibility. And because photography made a portrait so inexpensise, we see fewer itinerate naive artists doing portraits which were done in color. They simply couldn't compete with the photograohic studios. Now these artisrs were of uneven skill. Some of the images from the early-19th century were not all that skilled. But one thing an artist could get right regardless of his skill was color. And we just do not have these naive paintings for the second half of the 19th century in any appreciable numbers. One of the major sources of color informaztion is colorized photographs. We have archived both colorized photographic portraits and the paintings which we have found which provide useful color information. Of course a colorized image is not the same as a color photograph. Some caution has to be used in assessing these colorized images. We think that the studiod did try to get the color correct, if not the precise shade. Another factor is tht the tinting was usually done in light shades. This probably does not accurately reflect the prevalence of these shades. The light shades preserve the details of the the photograph. Dark tining would cover up these details. We note mny boys wearing blue dresses, butmodern color conventions do not sem to be prevalent in the 19th century. We note an unidentified child, probably a boy, wearing a red dress in 1859.

White and Black Dresses

Photography at the time boys wore dresses was all black and white, with a few colorized images. Thus we have very limited information on dress colors. The two colors we can identify with relative accuracy is white and black, especilly white. The photographic record clearly shows many children wearing white dresses. It seems to have been one if nit the most popular colors of boy desses, although this varied over time. There were both fashion and practical matters that made white so popular. Black dresses were not unknown, but much less common. And white was particularly popular, for younger children. We see quite a few of them. And white dresses they seem particularly popular at the turn of the century. This may have been because the boys wearing dresses were increasingly only younger boys. We see far fewer black dresses.

Gender

The question of gender and color is a fascinating one. One intertesting question is if colors varied for the dresses worn by boys and girls. We know that there were 20th century gender color conventions. These conventions do not appear to have been well established in the 19th century. We are not sure, however, if there were other conventions in the 19th century or to what extent that 20th century trends had begun to develop in the late-19th century. And here we are primarily interested in the 19th century because this is when boys were wearing dresses. Information on color is limited because of the black-and-white photography, but there are some sources of information.

Created: 1:08 AM 7/6/2009
Last updated: 9:58 PM 9/19/2020