Spanish Fashions – Summer 1881

Two women are depicted outdoors near a lake or river and a mansion. The woman on the left wears a black straw hat with a turned up brim, decorated with black plumes. Her dress is black with a high collar and long sleeves. The dress is black on black floral pattern, and bands of black velvet trim the bodice and skirt. A red, yellow, and blue striped sash is tied around her hips, and a band of the same is at the hem of her skirt.

There are small white ruffles at the neck and cuffs, and the bodice comes to a steep double point at the front at hip level. She wears brown gloves and holds four roses in her left hand. The woman on the right wears a straw hat with pink ribbon and plumes. Her dress is pink with a darker pink floral pattern and is cut in princess lines, with a narrow pink ruffle trimming the wrap front edge, all the way to the hem, which is below knee length. The collar is a ruff of white lace, and the sleeves are three-quarter length with white lace ruffles at the cuffs.

The underskirt is diagonal rows of pleated pink with a deeper pink pleated band at the hem. A wide dark pink satin bow on her left hip accents the wrapped overskirt of the dress, with the ends reaching to the hem of the skirt. She wears brown gloves, a bracelet on her left hand, and carries a furled pink parasol trimmed with white ruffles in her right hand.

Credit: The Claremont Colleges