Overview
The Industrial Revolution made cloth cheap and, from mid-century, the sewing machine and paper patterns; dress became a strict language of respectability and class.
Key garments and style
Women’s silhouettes shifted from the wide crinoline (1850s–60s) to the back-projecting bustle (1870s–80s) to a slimmer 1890s line, always over a corset. Men wore the dark three-piece suit, the frock and morning coats and the top hat, with Savile Row setting the bespoke standard, and the English couturier Charles Worth shaped the age from Paris.
Transition
The new century swept away the corset and the elaborate silhouette.