20,000 Years of Fashion : The History of Costume and Personal Adornment  

Fashion (Kyoto Costume Institute)

The Art of Dress : Clothes and Society, 1500-1914

A History of Costume

The History of Costume : From Ancient Mesopotamia Through the Twentieth Century

The Man of Fashion: Peacock Males and Perfect Gentlemen

Schedule:  

1/23  Intro & syllabus, cover basic ideas in the history of fashion.  Video Fashion and Clothing (VH-5094)

Handout “Library Costume Resources: a Supplement”

1/30 Slide lecture: Prehistoric dress, The needle before the Wheel.  Ancient dress, Greek & Roman Myths and realities of pagan decadence. Field trip to the Library.

2/6 Slide show:  Late Antiquity, Byzantine & Early Medieval aka “500 years of camping out” Video: The History of Hair 

2/13 Slide Show: Medieval affluence rising.  Video: Headdress Through the Ages Library Tour 2: 1^st and 4^th Floor (Indexes) 

2/20 Slide Show: Late Medieval/Early Italian Renaissance; the planned obsolescence of "fashion" .Video: Unmentionables, the History of Underwear 

2/27 Slide show: 16th Century, Bursting at the seams; corsetry, slashing, and the first great struggle between rapid change and conservatism. Library Tour #3: 2^nd & 3^rd Floors 

3/6 Early 17th Century, Sex vs. Religion in dress and politics. Absolutism in the age of Louis XIV DVD of either The Three Musketeers or Vatel or video of Restoration 

3/13 SPRING BREAK  March 13-17 

3/20 Slide Show: The 18^th Century 

3/27 Slide Lecture: 1789-1815, Revolution and fashion  then meet in costume shop for introduction to antique/vintage clothing. Demo of "dating" antique garments from pictures and patterns 

4/3 Meet in costume Shop for Demonstration: Industrial tools race Pre-Industrial stitchers and their tools.  Experience the wonders of the sewing machine, rotating pinkers, improvements in scissors, mass-produced pins, and other gadgets that radically altered clothing production for all time. Slide lecture: 1815-1840 Industrialization, Romanticism and the separation of the sexes. 

4/10 Slide lecture: 1840-1880 Conspicuous consumption. Meet later in Costume Shop to fondle 20^th century shoes and old catalogs, using the latter to “date” the former. 

4/17 Slide Lecture: 1880-1900 Dress reform. Video: The Story of Fashion, pt 1,   

4/24 Slide show: 1900-1915 The New Woman, The New Man and the rise of sportswear.  Video: The Story of Fashion, pt 2,  Slide show: 1910-1929 Orientalism and Art Deco from Russia and Paris. 

5/1 Slide show: 1930-1945 Fabric conservation and rationing.: Videos The Story of Fashion, pt 3, After seeing the three videos of The Story of Fashion, compete at doing the best Karl Lagerfeld impersonation in class.  NO credits, but Tara will award a costume book to the winner.  

5/8 Final Exam Period TBA times for oral presentations of projects if needed. Video: Wearable Art  

Assignments:  The format of this course allows you to choose two or more project assignments from a variety of project types, and deliver them in your choice of several formats.  The goal is that you should learn both about methods of research and details about a select subject in fashion history in each project.  However the format you choose to demonstrate successful research+analysis=knowledge can be in any format in which you feel competent and comfortable.  Projects may be done EITHER by single individuals, or by groups of two or more students at your discretion. The number of projects you do can also vary. How this works is that every assignment is "worth" a certain number of points depending on the nature of the assignment and it's difficulty.  As a student you are required to finish project assignments adding up to 100 credits overall.   

Major Projects:

1.      Do a detailed research project on the origins of a well-known iconic costume of a mythical being.  Examples: Angel, Devil, Wizard, Space Alien, Santa Claus, Fairies, Death, Vampire, Witch, or Liberty. Trace the evolution of the costume from its earliest examples, using both text and visual sources.  If possible, show or describe how other cultures costume these figures. Show when, and how, the ideas about the “look” of the being first became “fixed” into an easily recognizable archetype.  Cover why you think this archetype became the recognized standard in our culture. 50 credits

2.      Similar to above project, but trace the origin of the dress of a real group of people that has, over time, been turned into a theatricalized icon. Examples: Pirates, Cavemen, Court Jesters/Clowns, Cowboys, or Frontier Prostitutes.  Show what is known about the real dress of these people in their own time, then trace the process by which theatrical and film costume designs made for these characters has caused an iconic version to be recognized as a standard. What does the icon mean? 50 credits

3.       Do a detailed research project on the history of fashion in any group not covered in detail in the class lectures.  This may include the dress of non-Western nations and tribes, sub-groups in society like Punk, Pre-Raphaelite dress reformers, or fetishists, or the Traditional dress associated with an occasion like weddings, coronations or funerals, or associated with a profession like lawyers or prostitutes.  Cover how this dress changed over time, and how the dress has significance for the group that created it and wore/wears it.  50 credits.

4.      Study a group of Garments in a given decade from our Costume History Collection, or which you own, and look for examples of similar garments in primary source material of the time.  (Garments must be older than you are).  Assemble a report, using the garments as the center of focus, on this time in costume history. Note: Items from our history collection cannot be worn as part of a presentation/performance. Exceptions may be made if the garment in question is determined to be strong enough, and not too tight for the wearer. 50 credits.

5.      Design a series of 6 paper dolls of various eras or nationalities, and their clothes, including underwear, accessories, and a change of clothes.  Paper dolls should be in color, or should be in clear B&W ready to color outlines, suitable for Xeroxing for K-6 classes.  50 credits.

6.      Make yourself a complete costume for historical reenactment and document it’s authenticity in the manner prescribed for competition in the Costume Con Historical Masquerade. If you have no idea what this means, ask. 50 Credits.

7.      Sew 5 or more historical outfits for fashion dolls, such as you might use to teach a K-6 class about fashion history.  You may use commercially available historic doll patterns (ask Tara) BUT you must document your choices in color, fabric, and details with pictures from contemporary sources. 50 credits.

8.      Apart from garments, fashion also includes issues of body image, modification and cosmetics. Do a detailed research project on one of these topics. 50 Credits.

Minor Projects:

1.      Study a single garment in our Costume History Collection, or which you own, and look for examples of similar garments in primary source material of the time.  (Garment must be older than you are).  Assemble a short report, describing what you have learned about the garment and it’s context in it’s period. 20 credits.

2.      Study a single garment in our Costume History Collection, or which you own, and make a pattern from it either in scale on a graph paper grid, or sewn up in muslin or other fabric.  Either write out the details of what you would need to do to replicate the garment for an actor, or actually do so. 20-40 credits depending on how complex the project is.

3.      Most people study the history of fashion in order to better replicate the fashions of the past for reenacting or for drama (theatre/TV/movies).  Yet at a certain point in designing and making any replication of past clothing, the designer must make artistic or practical choices that are at times at variance with historical probability. Analyze a movie that has costumes set in a period other than the one in which it was made.  Good choices include: Elizabeth, Angels and Insects, Gone With the Wind, Tom Jones, Cleopatra, and Chicago. Write a 1 to 2-page review of the film you saw addressing all of the following topics: The basic story. The style of the film. The extent to which the costumes in the film supported the story. The extent to which the costumes appeared to conform to real images from the past. Why you thought the costumes were successful or unsuccessful overall. 10 credits. Doing 8 reviews of these and posting them, with pictures, to the WWW adds up to a 100pt major project.

4.      Kill many magazines and do drawings or Xeroxes to make a neat, labeled scrapbook of contemporary fashion pictures that show design elements taken from other eras, shown next to an example from that era with the same feature.  This “scrapbook” can also be in the form of PowerPoint, web page, etc. 20 credits.

5.      Contrast styles in art and architecture with fashions of the same era, identifying similarities (or differences) in line, color and motifs. These may be many examples from a single era, or scattered examples from several eras.  This project can be submitted entirely in the form of pictures, in a manner similar to that of the James Laver book Style and Costume. 20 credits.

6.      Design a single paper doll of one era or nationality, and their clothes, including underwear, accessories, and at least 5 changes of clothes, with labeling of when these clothes are worn.  Paper dolls should be in color, or should be in clear B&W ready to color outlines, suitable for Xeroxing for K-6 classes.  20 credits.

7.      Sew an historical outfit for a fashion doll, such as you might use to teach a K-6 class about fashion history.  You may use a commercially available historic doll pattern (ask Tara) BUT you must document your choices in color, fabric, and details with pictures from contemporary sources. 10 credits

8.      Make a short report on the controversy/political ramifications about one of the following clothing items: Legal wigs, Penis Gourds, Hijab, or Wonderbras. 20 Credits. 

Fun Weird Projects: We could do these during the final period. These are not open to variations in presentation format.

1.      Group project: Create a “Jeopardy” game using information you all got in my thrilling lectures to help the class review our material near the end of the semester. You must have 6 categories, as well as final jeopardy, and follow the TV format.  Other students (not in your group) will act as contestants.  Tara will award a costume book to the winner. 20 credits per group member, or 50 for a solo effort.

2.      Similar to above, but make cards for a Trivial Pursuit Game using any trivia found on the historical sections of The Costumer’s Manifesto: http://costumes.org Tara will award a costume book to the winner.  20 credits per member of a group, or 50 for a solo effort. 

3.      Make up a crossword puzzle using at least 30 words you learned in class.  Definitions should be in the clue section, and the terms in the puzzle.  Present copies to the entire class. Tara will award a costume book to the first successful person to complete the crossword. 20 points.

Delivery Formats:  Not all projects are adaptable to all delivery formats; use common sense. 

1.      A formal written research paper, with pictures and footnotes.

2.      An oral presentation, with some sort of visual component such as slides, costumes, handouts for all, etc.

3.      A binder of highlighted and organized research material with written notes and occasional commentary.

4.      A web site, with pictures and text.

5.      A video.

6.      A live multimedia performance.

7.      A PowerPoint presentation. 

Group Presentations:  If you wish any project to be done by two or more of you this is quite OK.  People can often motivate more when studying with a group of friends.  However, it should be obvious that the more people who are working on a project, the more quantity or quality are expected in the finished results.  So, for example, I would expect a single person doing an oral report on a major project might take 10-20 minutes to do a presentation, whereas a group should reasonably do more.

Grading:  Grading is based on an average of your letter grades for the total of these assignments.  Completing less than the full number of 100 project credits can lower your grade.   

Extra Credit:

Maintaining a close to perfect attendance record can earn you up to 10 extra project points.  An attendance sign in sheet will be passed around during each class, and students who miss no classes will automatically receive 10 extra credit points.  Students who miss 1-2 classes will get 7 extra credits, students who miss 3 classes get 5 extra credits.