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American Little Lord Fauntleroy suits: age grading
Little Lord Fauntleroy Suits: Age Grading
Figure 1.--Here we see a cabinet card portrait of two unidentified brothers who look to be about 10-4 years of age. Notice how differently they are dressed. The younger boy looks to be about 11-13 years of age and wears a fancy Fauntleroy knee pants suit with a floppy bow. His older brother looks to be about 14-15 years old and wears a three-piece single breasted suit with long pants. The studio was Heath, but we cannot make out the city. The portrait is undated, but we would estimate in part because of the style of the mount, the late-1890s. Often age grading took place in smaller steps. Click on the image for a fuller discussion.
Parents in the 19th and early-20th century tended to have larger families than is common today. Some parents liked to dress the children similarly or even the same, depending on age and gender. Other parents like to make changes in their clothing reflecting ages. Some of the changes were minor such as changing the collar or bow if the boys were close in age. In other instances, there were major differences like the type of the suit. Individual portraits of boys in Fauntleroy suits tells us that the boys were wearing the suits at a specific age. They of course do not tell us if they wore Fauntleroy suits after the portrait was taken and for how long. For this the best evidence is family portraits showing children at different ages. If older brothers are wearing regular suits, we get an idea of the upper age ranges. Or if younger brothers we can tell when boys began wearing the suits. Of course there was no set rule and this was largely a family matter. There were also differences over time. Like the individual portraits, we often have to estimate ages. If the age difference between the boys is several years than the change over id difficult to judge, but if the boys are close in age, in gives us a very good idea at what age the shift was made in that family.
Many American 3 year olds wore Fauntleroy suits. This means actual Fauntleroy suits and not reguar suits with Fauntkleroy trim. It is the age we begin to see really large numbers of boys wearing Fauntleroy outfits. This included boys wearing skirted Fauntkleroy suits, mostly kilt suits. We aklso see knee pants suits. We believe that the popularity of the Fauntleroy suit enticed many mothers to breech their sons earlier than they might have done earlier. It was at the time (late-19th century) that the cebturies old convention of youngerv boys wearing skirted garments bergan to decline. The kilt suit outfits often used the standards Fauntleroy cut-away jacket that was used with the classic knee pants suits.
Age 4 years is one of the most common ages that American boys wore Fauntleroy suits. Most boys began wearing Fauntleroy at agec 3 year, but some only began at age 4 years. Quite a dfews were not yet breached at age 3 years. It seems to us that age 4-5 were by far the most common ages for Fauntleroy suits. Boys began school at age 6 years and most of these boys did not wear Fauntleroy suits. Of course some of those boys may have had Fauntleroy suits for special occassions. It is boys 3-5 years that were most likely to wear Fauntleroy suits. Of course all of this we can only estimate because few of the available images actually have ages specified. that said we are unlikely to be more than a year off at most. And our archive is verybsubstaial so it is a fair samoling.
It was very common for pre-school boys to wear Fauntleroy suits. The 5 year olds were the largest pre-school groiup. Kindergarden and pre-school were not very common. In the 1880s and 90s, mothers would often buy a Fauntleroy suit for a boys first outfit after breeching and many boys would contunue wearing Fauntleroy suits until the boys began primary suits. We also see elablorate Fauntletpy blouses wwith huge collars and cuffs along with large floppy bows. We also see primary school age boys wearing Fauntleriy suits, but the classic cut-away jacket becomes less common. Rather we begin to see regular jackets worn with Fauntleroy blouses and trim. But for 5 year olds we still seen mostly the classic small jackets. Older brothers unless several years older wore a variety of suits, but still knee pants suits like the Fauntleroy suits. We believe thgat 4 and 5 year olds were the two most common age grouo for Fauntkeroy suits. A lot of younger boys also wore them, but many of the younger boys were not yet breehes and still wearing skirted garments.
We still see quite a few little brothers wearing Fauntlelroy suits at age 6 years, but not nearly as many as was the case at pre school ages, 5 yeats old and younger. Age 6 years was a major transition point for boys because this was when they began suit. Thus in a lot of families we see boys younger than 6 years wearing Fauntleroy suits and those 6 years and older wearing more mature suits. This is confirmed by school photigraphs. We see some boys wearing Fauntleroy suits to school, but not very many and it was normally reserved for the younger children. Of course this did not mean a boy might still have a Fauntleroy suit at home for special occassions. And well to do families in the late-19th century might tutor their children at home. We note quite a number of boys older than 6 wearing Fauntleroy suits, but it was not nearly as common for boys older thsn 6 years. And this is conformed by numerous example we have found of age grading. Of course at age 6 years, the boy woyld have gotten another type of kneepants suit.
Age 7 Years
Age 10 Years
Age 11 Years
The portrait here of two unidentified brothers suggest that Fauntleroy suyits were worn through age 11 years (figure 1). Presumably the boy would have gotten a long pants suit like his brother when he turned 12 years or at least 13 years old. Boys at age 11 years commonly had some Fauntkeroy touches during the Fauntlroy era, but full Fauntleroy suits and accessories were much less common.
