The Historical Novel Society conference in San Diego was wonderful! Historical novelists are such interesting, funny and fascinating people. I enjoyed chatting with people at dinners, listening to authors and editors at workshops, volunteering, and dressing up!

My favorite session was put on my Karlee Turner Etter and was called Nineteenth Century Fashion, From the Inside Out.

Karlee started the session wearing only a corset over a chemise (and thus I learned that no woman would ever wear a corset against her skin, because then she would have to wash it regularly and that was difficult to do.)

Then, piece by piece, Karlee got dressed, and while she got dressed she explained what the pieces were called, how they were worn, how often they were washed, and all sorts of incredibly interesting facts. When she was all dressed this is how she looked:

 

This dress represents what a middle to upper middle class woman would have worn in the 1880s / 1890s in America, and thus is similar to how my own Miss Olivia Snow would dress.

 

 

 

 

 

 

I wore my own costume in the Saturday evening costume pageant. I had nothing to do with making it, and would thank its creator if I had her name. This dress was a gift, but my aunt and I did make the mobcap.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Thanks to author Christopher Cevasco for taking this picture during the costume pageant. Here’s another he took of everyone at the pageant:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And finally, I have two close-ups of my mobcap. My aunt was so generous in her skills, materials and work in creating this cap in time for the pageant. (Thanks to Princess Esmerelda for modeling the cap, though it was too big for her)

 

 

 

 

Note Princess Esmerelda’s cute little tail below the cap: