Colors in Fashion

·
· Bloomsbury Publishing
Ebook
256
Pages

About this ebook

Color speaks a powerful cultural language, conveying political, sexual, and economic messages that, throughout history, have revealed how we relate to ourselves and our world. This ground-breaking compilation is the first to investigate how color in fashionable and ceremonial dress has played a significant social role, indicating acceptance and exclusion, convention and subversion.

From the use of white in pioneering feminism to the penchant for black in post-war France, and from mystical scarlet broadcloth to the horrors of arsenic-laden green fashion, this publication demonstrates that color in dress is as mutable, nuanced, and varied as color itself. Divided into four thematic parts – solidarity, power, innovation, and desire – each section highlights the often violent, emotional histories of color in dress across geographical, temporal and cultural boundaries. Underlying today's relaxed attitude to color lies a chromatic complexity that speaks of wars, migrations and economics.

While acknowledging the importance that technology has played in the development of new dyes, the chapters explore color as a catalyst for technical innovation that continues to inspire designers, artists, and performers. Bringing together cutting-edge contributions from leading scholars, it is essential reading for academics of fashion, textiles, design, cultural studies and art history.

About the author

Jonathan Faiers is Professor of Fashion Thinking at Winchester School of Art, University of Southampton, UK, publishes internationally on fashion and textiles, and is editor of the journal Luxury: History, Culture, Consumption.

Mary Westerman Bulgarella is a consultant in the conservation, research, and display of historic textiles and dress, based in Florence, Italy and in Chicago, Illinois. She has been the Advisory Committee Coordinator of Costume Colloquium since its conception.

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