Figure 1.--This english caninet card shows an unidentified boy with a toy sailboat. The dealer indicated a date of 1891. We are not sure how he arrived at that. The studio was skillman in Richmond near London.

We are just beginning our assessment of English blouses and do not yet have a great deal of information. It is a difficult subject to assess because blouses are oftn civered up by jackets or other tops of some kind. The most common boy's blouse style in England was of course the sailor-styled middy blouse. The sailor style became one of the most important boys' style in fashion history. Although it was even more important in Europe than Britain. We also notice younger boys wearing fancy blouses trimed in lace and/or ruffles in a variety of different styles. We notice Fauntleroy blouses in the late-19th and early-20th century. In the late-19tyh century these were the basic suits younger boys wore. As the Fauntleroy styled declined, it became a style for formal occassions like weddings. The boy seen on the previous page was probably a member of a wedding party (figure 1). The Richmond boy here wears a Fauntleroy blouse with a huge collar (figure 1). They were not nearly as common as in France. We notice some younger boys wearing blouses with Peter Pan collars. Eton collars were detachable collars and thus not generally done as blouses at least until the blouses with small Eton-styled blouses appdeared in the mid-20th century.

Created: 8:30 PM 1/18/2023
Last updated: 8:30 PM 1/18/2023