.. Whitby England. This jet is approximately 182 million years old. Here it is fossilized wood from a species similar to the Chile pine or Monkey Puzzle tree. Jet is also found in Poland, Northern Spain, and near Erzurum in Turkey. A common gift for a Turk to bring to …
Fashion History Blog
Catch the Next Big One!
The Buffalo Gals will be performing “An Historic Fashion Feast” at the Cody Longterm Care Facility behind West Park Hospital, Saturday, September 29, 2018 10-11:30 am. Free and open to the public. This Really Big Show will feature THREE new Gals, and as many new ensembles! The script will feature …
Whitby Jet was a favorite for mourning jewelry…
.. in the Victorian era. Jet is a product of high pressure decomposition of wood from and ancient type of coniferous tree millions of years ago. It is found in hard form which is the result of carbon compression and salt water. Soft jet is the result of carbon compression …
Sketches of the loved one or tranquil scenes…
.. were put on the lockets, fobs, and pictures alongside hair or separate from it. Designs specific to the Victorian eras surrounded the sketch; usually highly ornamented with scrolls and symbols taken from ancient societies like Greek and Roman gods, or religious institutions. Often the cemetery was depicted, with the …
Watch fobs & little picture window lockets..
.. were a favorite of the Victorians to honor their dead, because they could put a sketch or photo of the deceased loved one in the front, and their hair in the back or vice versa. (Photos: 1855 locket and watch fob for mourning)
Hair from the deceased became an art form…
.. often combining the hair of several people (usually women or girls because it was long) into elaborate images.. some a little odd to our minds today. (Pictures: “Hair Shrines” to the dead from the 1860’s; a big business and an art form – as with this 18 carat gold …
No, we don’t have obsession with death, but…
.. the Victorians did. The other strange thing they did was to save their hair (women wore it long!) from their brush, and weave it into gifts for their loved ones. When a loved one died, these “hair lockets”, brooches, and watch fobs were worn in memory of the one …
Now you’re nervous we’ll show dead Victorians again…
.. we promise not to knowingly post any Post Mortem Victorian portraits on here. What you have to understand about the Victorians (1837 to 1bout 1900) is that they embraced technology and then did weird stuff with it.. like build a successful commuter hot air balloons, and then try to …
It’s hard to tell who’s dead in Post Mortem portraits…
.. and we’ve gotten scared to search for Victorian fashion photos because we’ll run across these when we least expect them, thinking it’s a lovely scene with siblings or mother and child. Can you tell in the two portraits who is dead? (Hint: the ones who are fuzzy are the …
Along with mourning rituals, a new post mortem obsession…
.. of taking photographs of the dead person gained huge popularity in the Victorian era. It was common late in the Civil War mid-1860’s to take pictures of the dead man sitting with his family. As 1900 approached and photographic and ability to prop up the dead tachniques improved, it …