“It’s quite clear you wouldn’t get into a carriage in this,” Virgil Johnson says. “You wouldn’t wear lace in a carriage.” The dress he’s talking about, made of black satin embroidered with bright flowers, with a black lace underskirt and a high mandarin collar, belonged to Mrs. Samuel Allerton, and it probably never was worn in a carriage.
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Most recently, though, Johnson has used his knowledge to curate an exhibit of dresses from the 1880s–a period when the number of millionaires in Chicago was increasing rapidly and when elaborate dress, the result of an elaborate social code, was the rage. “The Proper Lady: Fashion and Etiquette in the 1880s” runs through February 11 at the Chicago Historical Society.
The show was the brainchild of Elizabeth Jachimowicz, at that time the museum’s costume curator. She asked Johnson to work with her, and together they picked dresses from the society’s huge collection from the 1880s (the 35 in the exhibit represent about half the museum’s total holdings from that period). Johnson was no stranger to the collection: he’s worked on four previous exhibits with Jachimowicz. So when Jachimowicz resigned in June, Johnson was put in charge of the exhibit.
Most of the dresses in the exhibit fall into one of four categories: dresses for staying home in the morning, dresses for entertaining guests in the afternoon, dresses for going out in the afternoon, and evening dresses. (There are also wedding and mourning dresses on display.) Some of the dresses, Johnson says, had overlapping functions: a few of the walking dresses, for example, were fancy enough–“indoorsy” enough–to double as afternoon reception dresses. Others, with their sturdy wool skirts, were as unsuited to a parlor as Mrs. Allerton’s dress was to a carriage. Rarer still were day dresses that could make the transition to evening.
A slew of special lectures and other events are happening in conjunction with the exhibit; call 642-4600 for a schedule. The historical society, on Clark Street at North Avenue, is open 9:30 to 4:30 Monday through Saturday and noon to 5 Sunday; admission is $1.50, 50 cents for children and seniors, free on Mondays.
