15. Cream Wedding Dress of Silk Moire and Wool

ID#: VC2004032
Date: 1889 (circa)
Materials: silk moire, wool blend, metal wire (in collar)

This dress was donated by Nancy Brandon Allen (Vassar class of 1949). The silk moire has deteriorated, and has been covered with conservation net to prevent further tearing. The inset at the neck, and front lacing, are modern reproductions to provide a better view of what the dress would originally have looked like.

There were several trends that brides subscribed to in the 1870s. Not only did they wear bustles and orange blossoms, a symbol of maidenhood and fertility, they also began to wear white.  Though Queen Victoria wasn’t the first bride to wear the color at her wedding, she was the one to popularize it in 1840.  As Godey’s Lady Book noted a few years after the wedding, “Custom has decided, from the earliest ages, that white is the most fitting hue, whatever may be the material.”  However, there were brides who continued to wear other colors, such as blue or the ivory of this dress, allowing them to reuse the garment.

- Alexandra Figler (Vassar class of 2016) and Holly Hummel (Vassar College Drama Deparment Faculty Emerita)