Flounced Petticoat Research (c.1840-1865)

In response to a research inquiry, I started compiling the primary sources I could find about flounced petticoats in the period 1840-1865. For this project, I looked at petticoats or underskirts worn as foundational garments, and not the visible petticoats used in court dress or walking ensembles (Balmoral petticoats). I was mostly searching for evidence of how commonly flounced petticoats were used (especially before the advent of hoops), and how they were constructed.

Written sources 

 

For this part, my search terms where for the word "petticoat" along with: ruffle(d), flounce(d), frill(ed), and/or tier(ed). The results included both descriptions of flounced petticoats, and passing mentions. In some instances, the ruffled petticoats are described as being stiffened; flounces are sometimes described in structural terms, and elsewhere treated as decorative elements.

 

I) Flounced petticoats as structural garments and alternatives to hoops. 

 

I started this project aware of one written reference to a flounced petticoat as an alternative for hoops. It is described the first paragraph under "chitchat" in the August 1862 issue of Godey's. Rather than being constructed like a flounced skirt with visible tiers of ruffles on a base, this garment is said to have graduated ruffles, where the upper ones fully cover the layers below. As far as I'm aware, this description of a novelty from France is something that never became popular in the US. A British publication and another American magazine, also from 1862, attribute this petticoat exclusively to the French Empress Eugenie, opining that the material and necessary pressing of such a garment put it out of reach for women of  'moderate fortune', but would provide ample work for seamstresses and laundresses.

Earlier references to supportive flounced petticoats pre-date the hoop:

"...Petticoat with four flounces well starched. The starched petticoat is indispensable for ball toilets." -Fashion plate description in Blackwood's Lady's Magazine, April 1852. [The plate is unfortunately not included in scanned document.]

"A lining or petticoat of crinoline is frequently adopted as a means of supporting the dress. More recently, petticoats of thick cambric, trimmed with two or three deep flounces reaching to the height of the knees, have come into fashion. The dress falls in graceful folds over a petticoat of this latter description and at the same time has sufficient support ."

-Peterson's August 1854

Flounces are also associated with stiff crinoline petticoats. Hints on Dress (1854) has decided opinions on petticoat numbers and materials, but only mentions flounces in conjunction with crinoline petticoats.

A remark in Peterson's two years later recommends that crinoline petticoats (and other stout fabrics) should have a single flounce, and that such garments are superior to hooped petticoats:

"A grass-cloth, crinoline, or moreen petticoat, should always be flounced, if the dress is desired to "stand out." Nothing can be more ungraceful than a hoop, whereas, a flounce on the petticoat always makes the skirt fall elegantly. Some have two flounces on the petticoat, the lower and wider one passing all around, but the upper one not meeting for the space of nearly half a yard in front." 

-Peterson's, July 1856

The only example I've seen of a petticoat with flounces extending all the way up is this English patent from 1857. It calls for four straw or steel-stiffened flounces, which are spaced from hip to hem--though one variation dispenses with the flounces entirely in favor of the straw. From the description, I'd classify it more like a hoopskirt than any other kind of petticoat. It's also a patent, which does not guarantee that such garments were actually produced for wear.

 

II) Flounced petticoats worn with wrappers.

 

While intending to look for true undergarments in which the flounced served a structural purpose, I did note several instances of white petticoats with flounces worn under open wrappers, like so. In one instance, an 1854 Peterson's description, a petticoat with a single deep fluted flounce is used to add volume to a wrapper. Elsewhere, the flounces are implied to be decorative:

 "White embroidered wrappers...are usually made open in front, exposing a embroidered or flounced petticoat. These are divided into several categories as follows: First, rich petticoats embroidered full almost up to the knees or with insertions. Next, those trimmed three deep flounces, hemmed and fluted a la Pompadour. Then, those ornamented with small plaits about half a yard from the bottom, and lastly those having a deep hem and edged with lace." 

--Peterson's, August 1856

Open wrapper over a frilled petticoat. The Lady's Friend, 1864.

In some circumstances, ruffled petticoats under wrappers may carry a connotation of being over-dressed. In a short story from 1864, a petticoat with lace and ruffles worn under an open morning gown is dubbed 'too elaborate' for wearing aboard a ship. A story in the Lady's Friend that same year mentions a soon-to-widowed lady (with the questionable taste to wear rouge) donning a ruffled petticoat under a crimson wrapper. 

 

III) Other References to Flounced Petticoats

Peterson's (1855) mentions flounced petticoats replacing embroidered ones. I set this reference apart, because it goes on to mention straw sometimes being used to stiffen the hem, in order to continue the line of the underlying hoops. So, this appears to be an instance in which the flounced petticoat is being used with hoops, but the flounces themselves are implied to be decorative, and there's an additional structural element for shaping (the straw-reinforced hem).

A short story from 1855 mentions a character wearing petticoats trimmed with tape and frills under a flounced silk dress. These are not described in more detail.

A ruffled dimity petticoat is appropriate for wear under a ballgown in a 1859 story.

 

The "simply ruffled petticoat" is contrasted with the expensive embroidered and fringed petticoats currently in fashion (1859). 

'Ruffled petticoat' is used as metonymy for 'a pretty girl' in an 1865 narrative.

IV) Pre-Made Frills.

Towards the end of the hoop era, ready-made frills are sometimes named as a petticoat trim.

An 1862 ad for ready-made cambric flounces recommends the largest size for "the new Paris fashion of frilled petticoats." The reference line suggests these are about 2" wide.

In 1864, The Lady's Friend gives instructions for a muslin petticoat. The skirt is made of gored panels, then finished with two 3.5" gauffered frills around the edge

 

Original garments 

 

I've yet to see an original petticoat from the 1840s-1860s constructed like a flounced skirt. There are a couple examples of surviving petticoats with a single ruffle or flounce near the hem, like this:

 

Petticoat with one small frill around the hem.
American, 1850-1860, in The Met

The Kent State University Museum also has an 1840s quilted petticoat with an "applied tucked ruffle at [the] hem." A tucked petticoat from the 1840s in the Smithsonian has a scalloped edge slightly gathered into a frill. There's also a petticoat with a deeper single flounce in the V&A, though I suspect it's from the 1865-1874 part of its date range rather than the 1850-1860 part--the shape is awfully narrow up top, apparently gored to join the waistband smoothly with no fullness.

As described in contemporary texts, there are also flounced crinoline petticoats. The few of these I've seen tend to have their single flounce higher up on the garment, like so:

 

Crinoline Petticoat, 1840s, The Met.

I searched my main online collections (LACMA, the Met, V&A, MFA, also Kent State, Williamsburg, and the Smithsonian), and didn't find any other petticoats with flounces from the 1840-1865 period. Their collections are full of quilted, corded, embroidered, tucked, and even petticoats trimmed with lace, but not flounced ones. The relative scarcity of flounced petticoats in museum collections may arise from a variety of causes. Flounced petticoats may have been uncommon, with few ever existing in the first place. Alternatively, they may have been so common that they were not deemed as worthy of preservation as petticoats with expensive lace or embroidery. The flounced petticoats may also have been good candidates for re-making and re-modelling as styles changed.

 

Conclusion

 

From the textual evidence, flounced or frilled petticoats did exist and were used prior to the invention of the hooped petticoat. Some sources from the late 1850s to early 1860s put flounced petticoats into competition with steel-hooped petticoats, while others imply or outright state that frilled petticoats were worn over hoops.

 

Surviving garments and detailed descriptions of flounced petticoats are not abundant, but the ones I have found so far indicate that the norm was 1 or 2 ruffles extending no higher than the knee, with 4 flounces as the maximum. Some of these garments may have used the flounces or frills as adornment, not just for volume. Mentions of flounced petticoats not infrequently pair them with open wrappers.

 

I have so far found no evidence for white cotton petticoats being constructed like tiered skirts, with flounces extending the length of the garment.