A Tangent- but still costume and history based!

I spent part of the Autumn exploring the idea of clothing and words being linked at very particular times. This developed in response to my father's illness and the desire to wrap him the words he couldn't hear us say, to tuck them into the creases, seams and pockets of his pyjamas for him to find and hang onto as he woke up.
This became a textile installation  currently on exhibition in York, but also lead to other ideas.

What would result from combining primary sources with appropriate costume ?  One way to find out.


 Finding documents written by the mill workers proved difficult so contemporary  documents arising from their lives - a newspaper report and official factory accident report had to do as start points for the experiment.

National Archives is a great place to get lost in, virtually and really, but the first find was a newspaper report following an inquest  in Bristol 1860 on Elizabeth Davis, a 16 year old textile mill worker. She been injured at work and later died.

 The mill and the area was quite well documented with photographs from the era, so these were the start point for a simple work dress loosely based on a quarter scale version of a day dress in Janet Arnold's Patterns of Fashion. The account of the accident was embroidered across the bodice and around the skirt.





Martha Appleton was the small dress, 18cm high, and around the hem are quotations from her accident report. She had been injured at work, losing fingers on her left hand.




Made of cotton lawn to keep them delicate and light,  they were dipped in glue to set it into 3 dimensions. Martha was dip dyed but Elizabeth has been rubbed with graphite powder to age  them.

I still haven't made my mind up about them. There are things I would change, scale, the lettering, complexity of the make, but they are also in the exhibition along with extracts from the documentation. The initial responses have been very positive, even emotional.......