Hooded jacket
Category
Costume
Date
1745 - 1760
Materials
Silk satin, silk, linen and wool
Order this imageCollection
Snowshill Wade Costume Collection, Gloucestershire
NT 1348886.2
Caption
This hooded jacket and petticoat provide an exceptionally fine example of quilting, a technique popular in the 18th century. Adding both warmth and ornamentation to clothing, quilting had a practical as well as decorative purpose. The surface decoration, which covers the entirety of the stone-white silk satin, would have been immensely time consuming – and therefore costly – to complete, making this a precious possession. A combination of techniques has been used. Wadded quilting, where a layer of wool is inserted between the top and bottom pieces of fabric and then stitched or ‘quilted’, is used for the geometric diaper pattern of four small repeating squares. The motifs and borders employ Italian trapunto, where the pattern is stitched before being slit from the rear and then stuffed with padding, and corded quilting, which uses thick thread to pad between the layers and define the stitching. The shallow swags of heavily stylised flowers and leaves, serpentine lines, shell motifs and elbow-length sleeves with a deep pointed ruffle are all indicative of the influence of the Rococo style. Kate Bethune
Summary
Hooded jacket - Made of stone white silk satin, quilted overall with matching thread. 0.125 inch (3 mm) band of bright green at selvedge. bodicee and stomacher fronts lined with linen. bodicee lining fitted with 7 bones. Front edges and stomacher also boned. Hip length jacket with fitted body and pleated skirt - cut in one. bodice front has wide revers with centre-front opening and stomacher pieces with tabs. Centre-back seam and 2 underarm seams, opening out into wide box pleats at waist. Elbow length sleeves with deep pointed ruffle. Hood has one seam centre-back. Pleated into back neck. Skirt has partial border of shallow swags with flowers and leaves, and the sleeves flounches are quilted overall in similar desings. Fastens at the centre front with 10 hook and eyes, 8 and 6 respectively being original, steel (possibly tin plated) wire, with flattened tips to the hooks. Jacket could have been made up from another petticoat as motifs are assymetrical. cf Janet Arnold 'Patterns of Fashion' p 30; Nancy Bradfield 'Costume in Detail' p21.
Provenance
Given to National Trust with Snowshill Manor in 1951 by Charles Paget Wade
References
Bradfield, 1968: Nancy Bradfield, Costume in Detail, 1730-1930, Harrop, London, 1968, pp.21-22 Jane Ashleford, The Art of Dress. Clothes and Society 1500-1914, The National Trust, 1996, p.133 Antrobus and Slocombe 2025: Helen Antrobus and Emma Slocombe, 100 Things to Wear: Fashion from the collections of the National Trust, National Trust 2025, pp. 64-65.