ABSTRACT
The fashion historian Anne Buck described the “period, 1890–1914, and particularly between 1900 and 1908” as “the great epoch of underwear.” Ordinary fashion journals and other women's magazines devoted relatively little attention to the subject of underclothing, and illustrations tended to show these items of clothing discreetly folded, rather than on the human figure. The great exception was petticoats, which were often more decorative and colorful, because they were often glimpsed. The vogue for woolen underwear led some fashion historians to characterize the 1880s as a period of “healthy” underwear, in sharp contrast to the “sexy” Edwardian period, when luxurious silk lingerie received tremendous emphasis in the fashion press. The desirable eroticism of lingerie was recognized some two decades earlier by writers and illustrators for La Vie Parisienne. The image of the husband dressing his wife seems less surprising than his open comparison of her with the dancers at the Opera.
