A Lady of Fashion, Barbara Johnson’s Album of Styles and Fabrics
Rothstein, Natalie (ed.). A Lady of Fashion, Barbara Johnson’s Album of Styles and Fabrics. First Edition. 1987. Book and dust jacket are both in very good condition—previous owner’s name and address is written discreetly on the flyleaf.
Fashion is supposed to be ephemeral. Most styles last a season or two before disappearing from memory. Yet Barbara Johnson’s wardrobe survived in a form no one could have anticipated. From 1746 to 1823, she meticulously documented her clothes, preserving fabric swatches, bills, and fashion engravings in an album unlike any other. Now housed at the Victoria & Albert Museum, the original is too fragile to be handled, making this large-format facsimile the next best thing. It offers an intimate glimpse of everyday life in Georgian England. More than a historical curiosity, it is a surprisingly modern lesson in the thoughtful purchase, alteration, and reuse of clothes.
“The secret of dressing lies in a certain adaptation to your figure, your rank, your circumstances. No woman is at forty what she was at twenty, nor at sixty, what she was at forty.”
--Mirror of the Graces