Portraits of Nevada: Patterns

Ready-Made: Patterns

Examples - January 1857
- June 1857
- October 1859
- March 1960

Butterick produced the first commercial paper pattern in 1866 for a ladies wrapper. McCall's entered the pattern market in 1870. (Mills, p. 91) Before the era of the paper pattern, women depended upon old garments or ideas outlined in the fashion magazines.

Harper's Bazaar furnished pattern supplements in their magazine. They provided the shape and instructions for constructing as many as 17 items on one page. There were also a number of pattern systems developed in the 1850s and 1860s. Many dressmakers used such systems which were often based upon proportions.

Dressmaker | Ready-Made Contents | Methods

Portraits of Nevada

Please direct questions to: Virginia Vogel (gini@scs.unr.edu)

URL of this document: http://www.unr.edu/sb204/theatre/pttrntoc.html

Last Modified: november 1, 1996