This is a post I found in my drafts. I started it a literal decade ago (yes, 2015!) and somehow never finished it. I wrapped it up and am publishing it now, even if it’s not very polished. The impetus for it was a lot of online debate at the time about how restrictive Victorian fashions were for children, that the clothes were cruel and unhealthy and toddlers were being forced into tight-laced corsets to keep them skinny– things like that. The debate has settled down a bit now, but like many fashion myths, it still resurfaces now and then. Plus, I really love 1880s kids fashions. They have a lot of personality and a very unique silhouette you don’t really see anywhere else in history.

The Victorian era saw the rise of distinct child fashions.

History isn’t just costume and clothes. The dress of a decade also deeply reflects the social, religious, and political atmosphere/events that occurred at the time. Children were dressed very much like miniature adults and, in general, were expected to act mature and responsible like adults.

“The concept of children having particular rights is a relatively new one. Traditional attitudes towards children tended to consider them as mere extensions of the household and ‘owned’ by their parents &/or legal guardian, who exerted absolute parental control.” – Wikipedia, Children’s Rights Movement

In the upper class, children were frequently married young to seal alliances and increase familial wealth, and in the low classes, they were put to work in dangerous conditions. The Industrial Revolution had a double-edged effect on the plight of children. On the one hand, it created factories full of dangerous new machinery, often manned by children and fueled by coal mined by minor miners. However, the Industrial Revolution also increased communication, among them novels and magazines that were widely distributed throughout the class levels. These platforms were the perfect tool for those opposed to the exploitation of children. Charles Dicken’s Oliver Twist is probably the most well known example.

The later decades of the Victorian era saw the rise of the modern, romanticized view of childhood and, in conjunction with this new philosophy, new child labor laws. While Victorians still expected children to act maturely, it also saw the rise of childhood as a very distinct life experience with a different set of expectations than any century prior. Children became the embodiment of human innocence rather than simply miniature adults. It was, however, mostly an upper and middle class notion. Poor children were still working 12-hour night shifts during the early decades of the 20th century until child-labor laws came into effect.

Young girl working in a cotton mill, circa 1908

Group of Youth Activists, early 1900s

That’s a lot of really heavy history to talk about on a costume blog, but nothing affects fashion like the lives of people wearing it! Whether you are intensely invested in historical accuracy or just want to feel pretty for a day, history is enormously important. Child labor, while mostly illegal in first-world countries around the globe, is still a massive, widespread practice. It’s not something that happened; it is still happening–including in the United States and other first-world countries. Debates about what type of work a child can be expected to do at what age for how long are still ongoing. Right now, many states and employers require you to be at least 16 to work without restricted hours and duties, but there are still jobs for younger teens (plus agricultural and family businesses are often exempt from age restrictions). We argue over proper parenting, how much child protection is too much, how little is too little– and we are still making, breaking, revising, and, in some cases, reducing laws about it that have very real life consequences for people everywhere.

So how does all this play into 1880s children’s fashion? The 19th century saw the rise of children’s literature as a full-fledged genre as education laws moved many children out of the house and workplace into mandatory schools. Childhood was a place of wonder, a time for happiness and imagination before the strict, regulated maturity of adulthood. This emerging view of children as innocent beings very much separate from the adult world combined with the widespread publication of fashion magazines created a new fashion ideal. Children’s clothes had always generally been less-restrictive than adult clothes with shorter skirts and fewer undergarments, but the late 19th century saw the rise of a separate style of children’s clothing.

In the 1880s, drop-waisted dresses with shorter, slimmer skirts came into fashion for young children. The look still echoed the carefully tailored bodices and bustled skirts of adult clothing at the time, but did not mimic it exactly, allowing for much more freedom of movement:

Young Girl, circa 1880-90

Young Girl, circa 1880

Young Boy in a Drop Waist Plaid Dress, circa 1885-90
The auction page for this photograph labels this image as a girl with her toy train. It’s actually a boy of about 5 years. The biggest clue to his gender identity include his side-parted, short hair and cap.

 It also differentiated between the immature, innocence of a child’s body and the sexually mature bodies of adults, particularly women. Children’s body shapes look very much alike until puberty. Indeed, throughout history up until the past century, young children, boys and girls alike, wore dresses for easy fitting, movement, and toileting. In the 1870s, the heavily flounced bustle made translating the style to children somewhat challenging, especially for toddlers. What developed was a looser, elongated, one-piece dress with a hint of the bustle at the back, like you can see on the little girl in yellow:

By the 1880s, the bustle was in its second decade and the children’s version had gone from exact miniatures of adult fashions, to a distinct column and flounce look:

Fashion Plate from May 1888

The 1880s is perhaps the most iconic “Victorian” style era. It’s probably the one most thought of when 19th century fashion is being discussed. During that period, women wore corsets and dresses designed to emphasize their adult curves and dresses were more closely fitted to the hip than ever before. You could say that the 1870s and 1880s were the era of the Victorian “body con” dress! However, unlike what corset-naysayers may say, not everyone in that era tight-laced, especially not children.

“Health Corset” Ad, circa 1890

On the topic of children in corsets, contrary to popular belief, children did not wear the same, tightly fitted corsets of their adult counterparts. There were “corsets” available for children, but they were softer than adult corsets and functioned primarily as back supports. Good posture and a healthy spine were (and still are) very important. As anyone with back problems can tell you–and I’m speaking from plenty of experience here– if your spine is out of whack, so are you! Corsets are still used as medical braces and supports in modern practice, especially for scoliosis (Bernadette Banner has a fun video comparing a brace to a corset). Plus, just like a young teen gets her first bra today, young teens got their first bust-supporting corset around the start of puberty. But not all children wore corsets and even fewer were tight-laced into them. Indeed, many of the harrowing tales of young girls being racked up from the ceiling to tighten their corsets down to 13 inches come directly from period fetish literature, but of course, there were parents who projected adult beauty standards onto their children (which is still a big issue today, no corsets required, in both internet and pageant culture). However, generally, in the 1880s, the long, columnar design of the bodice on children’s dresses fits the natural long, straight line of a child’s body without trying to mold it into an adult shape.

Fashion plate from June 1880
Notice how the little girl in the background’s dress is fitted compared to the adult ladies’ dresses in the foreground. The women’s floor-length gowns are carefully fitted over their curvy corsets while the little girl’s hangs rather loosely and reaches just below her knees to give her lots of freedom to move.

Fashion plate, October 1882
A variety of ages to be seen, both girls and boys.

The look of 1880s children’s clothes is quite unique and really adorable. It’s so rare to find patterns for them, though! I attempted to make one from a modern pattern myself:

Another place to find the look is in doll patterns, which I’ve considered scaling up to see if they’ll work out. Of course, I have no kiddos myself to try them out on, but the dresses are just so dang cute!

I still find it quite funny when I see people complaining about how Victorian children dressed: “Too many layers” “Suffocating” “Straight jackets” and the like. Why? Because so many little girls today continue to joyously run around in “princess” dresses that are equally fluffy, fitted, and frilly as their Victorian ancestors!

Let your littles dress up fabulously!
(and, heck, you can dress up fabulously, too!)