“For herself grandmother kept little, realizing with her unfailing good sense that haute couture was not for a farmer’s wife who made her own butter and went to chapel; although she was to be seen on occasions riding in the trap in a Vanderbilt blue cape with a storm collar lined with white fur.”
It’s hard for us nowadays to imagine just how grand the House of Worth really was. With its flagship atelier on the most intimidating street in Paris, the “father of haute couture” produced the best of the best in extravagant craftsmanship and design, with astronomical prices to match. Patronage from Empress Eugenie herself, plus the very elite of European and American society, cemented the House’s reputation at the very top of the sartorial tree.
But the myth went further than this. So extravagantly rich were some of its patrons that they only wore their impossibly lavish Worth gowns once or twice. Empress Eugenie is thought to have been seen in each sumptuous outfit only once, but she was not the only one.
Take the American Vanderbilts, for example. Their legendary fancy dress ball of 1883 saw all of New York’s elite society show up at their Fifth Avenue mega mansion dressed in various inventive ensembles, and crowds of celebrity spotters reportedly had to be held back by police. They were fabulously rich and famous…. and allegedly, also only wore their gowns once or twice.
What happened to these clothes after they were cast off by the hoi polloi? Piles of silks and furs must have been discarded. Did they keep them in vast walk-in wardrobes and pet them occasionally? Did they hand them on to their ladies’ maids? Sure, a few ended up in museums, but what happened to the rest?
By chance, I tracked down some of the Vanderbilts’ House of Worth purchases this week… and in the most appropriate, yet unlikely place. It seems that some of Worth’s work made it all the way back to the county of his birth – Lincolnshire, in the UK – under the most delightfully ridiculous circumstances!
The book referenced in the video is Hedingham Harvest by Geoffrey Robinson, and fortunately, the entire book is online – enjoy Chapter 6 for yourself here.
What a fun account! Can you even imagine getting a crate full of Worth gowns and capes? Be still my heart!
This is a phenomenal share. Worth has always been my favorite and one certainly wonders where they all have gone. Can you imagine receiving a crate of, not only Worth dresses, but all of the accessories, sent to me. You were meant to find that book Cathy.
Oh yes, if I wasn’t rich back then then I would love to be on the receiving end of those crates and wear flamboyant clothes and be totally ridiculous. 🙂
It actually makes me sad that these wonderful gowns were only worn once or twice. As a dressmaker, I know how much work, how much loving care goes into making such garments. To wear them only once seems so wasteful, not just of the expensive materials, but even more so of the artistry and skilled labour of the artisans who designed and made them. It is like eating only one bite of sumptuous custom wedding cake and then throwing the rest away. Or only spending 30 seconds looking at a John Singer Sargent painting and then shutting it away never to be seen again. You’re not getting a full appreciation of it.
the “male gaze, male gaze” comment made me laugh out loud
They fell apart! They were constructed for pizzaz and effect and not endurance. Many of the materials were perishable or too delicate to survive. It’s not really a mystery, anyone with any familiarity with them will tell you.
I wonder if the Lincolnshire attics and Storage chests Still contain some of these dresses.
How exciting to find such a wonderful tidbit about the past! I just went and found a copy of the book and will be reading it on. Thank you for posting this.
You might try contacting Vanderbilt Mansion National Historic Site to see what gowns they have left. They might have a Worth. It’s in Hyde Park, NY, just up from NYC. Email me for further info
I remember with great sadness wearing my grandmother’s 1918 Worth wedding dress as a dress-up when I was a child in the mid-1950s – it didn’t survive my childhood and I can barely remember the detail, but it was silk tulle with something like guipure lace from what I remember. Granny had brought it all the way to New Zealand with her in 1925, probably with the hope of my mother eventually wearing it, but she turned out to be such a different body shape it would never have fitted her.
“Hoi polloi” means the common people, not the wealthy!
So delightful! Thank you for sharing your intrepid adventures!
In a similar vein, what happened to creations of Lucy Duff-Gordon (or “Lucille,” as she was known professionally)? My own knowledge of her centers about, not surprisingly, the events of 14-15 April 1912 in the mid-Atlantic, but consistent, recurring theme in my research on her and her husband was that her designs were extravagant, expensive, and highly sought-after. There was a resurgence in interest in Lucy Duff-Gordon during the centennial of the Titanic disaster, but there while there seems to be significant interest in her influence as a designer (especially in the context of creating the “‘It’ girl” image and mystique, there doesn’t seem to be much extant, at least in terms of what is accessible to the public, of the actuall dresses, gowns, lingerie, etc. Lucy and her house created. Any thoughts on why that’s so?