Corset Waists: Chronology


Figure 1.-- This garment described as a corset waist was offered in the Warner Brothers catalog during the 1880s. Manufacturrs and retailers did not have consiset terms for many of their products. The garment here looks rather like an underwaist to us. The advertisement is not dated, but the illustration quality and type face suggests it was an early example, probably the 1880s. The text suggests that it was made of string material, but does not discuss function. The illustration suggests that it was essentially an underwaist and not a firm moldfing garment.

Corset waists for children seem primarily a 19th century garment. We note references to corset waists in late-19th century advertising. The Warner corset waist here is an early example (figure 1). It is not dated, but the illustration quality and type face suggests it was an early example, probably the 1880s. The text suggests that it was made of string material, but does not discuss function. The illustration suggests that it was essentially an underwaist and not a firm moldfing garment. An example is a newspaper advertisenent from 1890. Another example is an advertisement for a corset waist in a Good Housekeeping advertisement (1889). There are also references in the early-20th century. After the turn-of the 20th cenntury, however, the term corset generally went out of use in connection with children's under garments. This is a little difficult to assess with perceission as many illustrations we have found are undated, but it does seem to be largely the case. Of course corsets coninued to be widely sold in the 20th century, but not corset waists for children. What is difficult to tell is to what extent this chronological shift was changing usage of the term corset in contrast to the declining acceptance of restrictive form and posture control garments. Inderwaists and suspender waists continued to be widely worn, but these were garments to support pants and hosiery, not primarily to shae the child's body.







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Created: 5:37 AM 7/2/2010
Last updated: 5:37 AM 7/2/2010