An Antique 1890s Black Skirt With Brush Braid In My Collection

Lining, facing/interlining, and brush braid/skirt braid sections heavily edited October 24, 2019 and September 29, 2020

A jet black, very heavy skirt from the 1890s has long been in my collection of antique garments and haberdashery. Here it is below, on a rainy afternoon. I have all the lights turned on in the room and you can see just how jet black the skirt is.

What follows is a tour of the skirt, inside and out. I hope that you find the pictures and notes useful, especially if you are considering constructing a skirt of the period!

A jet black antique 1890s skirt; it absorbs light!
Don't worry, the rest of the pictures will be
lightened so details are visible.

I wore the skirt many years ago, for Halloween. Here are my mother, the twins as kitties, and me as a good witch, on Halloween night. Oh, how the twins loved their kitty ears and tails. I loved how the tail of this skirt looked, too. The back has pleasing folds.

The antique 1890s skirt worn when the boys were a year old, in 2008.

The skirt spends most of its time rolled away in a bin, but given that I am working on an 1890s outfit, and getting ready to mess with the set of the skirt hem, now seemed a good time to pull it out and examine its construction.

The Skirt Fabric

I am not sure exactly what fibers the skirt is made of, but some are shiny and some are rather matte; my suspicion is a silk and wool combination. It tends to fray a little on cut edges, but not too much; that's why I think wool figures into the composition. The fabric is rather thick, though it drapes well, and is very heavy, far heavier than the sorts of cloth we tend to wear today. The weave is wonderful and includes a repeat pattern, using the warp threads, of what could be considered fronds or grasses in bas relief, broken by tiny vee shapes, and surrounded but what I can only call a vermicelli pattern. A photo of it is below, lightened quite a bit to show the pattern and weave.

The skirt fabric under evening lamplight



The skirt fabric in detail: the photo has been lightened a great deal.

When laid out as flat as possible on the floor, it's possible to see just how much fabric is involved in its making. In the photo below, the underside of the skirt bottom is showing for some inches at the right. The fabric thickness is visible -- note how the skirt fabric stands proud of the carpet.

The Skirt on a Dress Form

The photos below show the skirt set on a dress form. There is no petticoat set beneath it; I wanted to show how the fabric drapes without any assistance. All the photos have been lightened quite a bit so that the fabric is visible.

When I found the skirt, it was hanging draped from the ceiling of an antique store in a small town near Kentucky's border with Tennessee. I do not know if the skirt was local to the area. It was draped to show the fabric, which I fell in love with immediately, but it was also obviously a damaged garment: there was evidence of any waistband, internal or external, any longer and no threads or marks to show where the waistband had been, if there had been an exterior waistband. The top of the skirt measured around 50" in circumference.

Not terribly long after I bought the skirt, I rebuilt the waistband by pleating the back panels in three large pleats to each side of the center back placket, and then folding the top of the skirt fabric over a strong waist stay tape and hand-sewing it carefully to the tape. I had no matching fabric for a separate waistband, obviously, and this seemed to be an effective solution that also did not cut into or otherwise harm the fabric. Using an interior waist tape with no observable exterior waistband is recommended by Sophie Klug in The Art of Dressmaking (1895), as useful "for women inclined to embonpoint", as she delicately put it on page 33. At the time I didn't know this. Instead, I was following later Edwardian practice.

I do not know how, exactly, the skirt was pleated originally. Was there a center box pleat? Was the placket hidden? Again, there are no longer any observable threads or marks to show.

Here is the front of the skirt. Note how narrow the front is meant to be -- so typical of the 1890s. The front panel measures about 11 1/4" wide at top, and 20 3/4" at bottom. It's currently 39 1/2" long.

1890s antique skirt, front

Here is the skirt from the side. There is only one side panel on each side, but each is large. At top it measures 6 1/2", and at bottom 28 1/4". It's currently 40 1/2" long.

Antique 1890s skirt, side

Here is the back of the skirt. It is made of two panels, each approximately 9 1/2" wide at top, 28" wide at bottom, and currently 41" long. Here is where the loveliness of a heavy, lusciously draping fabric so popular in the decade has its glory: look at how the fabric forms into heavy rounded folds, all by itself.


Antique 1890s skirt, back

The Skirt Turned Inside Out

I put the skirt onto the dress form inside out so that you can see the lining. At the top of the skirt, you can see how the fabric is folded over the white waist stay that I added, and you can see the placket, made in the fashion fabric. The entire skirt is lined. How the lining is managed, you will learn shortly.

The lining is a black polished cotton, very light and soft.



Antique 1890s skirt, inside out

An Approximate Pattern of the Skirt

I took an approximate pattern of the skirt. It's designed in, dare I say it, the "regulation" way for the middle years of the decade. Oh, how they loved the word "regulation" in 1890s magazines. I couldn't help but echo it. All seams are straight. There is no flaring towards the bottom of the panels that gives late decade and early 20th century skirts the look of the bell of a trumpet.

The front panel of the skirt is bias at both edges. In all likelihood, the fabric was folded lengthwise at center front, and cut so that each side would be identical. As recommended by books and magazines of the period, the edge of the front panel is on the bias, so the edge of the side panel that meets it must be on the straight. This ensures that the bias edge of the front is supported by the stronger straight grain of the side panel -- warp (lengthwise) threads are in general stronger than the weft (widthwise) threads. I don't have the quotations with me at the moment, but it was not uncommon for there to be only one side panel.

The skirt pattern, part 1. No attempt
has been made to create the rounded hemline.
Don't you like my fancy cellphone picture?

There are two back panels, and each is a mirror image of the other. The back panel pattern is pictured below. Just as with the front-panel-to-side-panel seam, the bias edge of the side panel meets the straight edge of the back panel.

Interestingly, the back panel also has a bias edge, and the center back seam is thus two bias edges, one from each of the back panels, seamed together. That seam would be prone to stretch. It is for that reason that there is a strip of brown cotton (cut on the straight of grain) sewn to one edge of the seam inside the lining. It is split down the middle -- split, not cut. More about this in a bit.

Again, because the waistband is missing and there are no longer any marks or threads in the fabric to show how the back was treated, I cannot tell you how the pleats were managed.

The skirt pattern, part 2

Before We Move On, an Interlude

Today I purchased two bins, and laid them on the floor near the back door. Within minutes, each was occupied by one of our kitties. Nutmeg, to the left, Lily, to the right.

Lily became interested in Nutmeg's bin. There was a nano-scuffle before the two buddies settled back into their temporary dens...

Skirt Construction Notes

Here are some notes I took about the construction of the skirt.

The Placket

The top part of the placket, that the viewer would see, had a protruding section about 1.5" wide that was simply turned over to the inside and the entire thing hemmed down on top of the lining...that meant that the lining was added before the placket was dealt with. The seamstress used the selvage edge of the skirt here -- you can see it clearly in the photo below, and thus did not have to turn edge of the placket under again, avoiding an unsightly bump.

Upper placket on inside, showing its selvage edge.

The lower piece of the placket is added to the edge of the skirt. It was stitched to the skirt right sides together, then turned to the inside of the skirt, the raw edge turned under a very small amount, and hand-hemmed, once again over the lining. There is a large, very strong snap in the middle of the placket. I do not know if it is original or not. I doubt it, because I understand snaps came in later. It's quite possible the skirt was altered for wear later. It is sewn on with very strong black thread.

View of antique 1890s skirt placket.

The Lining

The center back seam shows how the lining and skirt fashion fabric were handled. The lining and fashion fabric were treated as one piece, and the seam was sewn directly through both. This is flatlining. The skirt was not bag-lined, as would be common today. The piece of brown fabric that you see on the left side of the seam is cut on the straight, and the seam is sewn through it, the lining, and the fashion fabric. It functions as a stay. Per Sophie Klug in the 1895 book The Art of Dressmaking, "Where two bias edges are to be joined in one seam, a stay tape or strip of lining must be basted at one side and sewed in with the seam to prevent stretching." (p. 35)

Antique 1890s skirt, center back seam with seam stay used to stabilize the
fabric: both edges are on the bias.

At each seam which was on straight of grain, the lining's selvage was used, so it would not have to be hemmed down. It was simply seamed along with the fashion fabric and left. However, where the seam consisted of one bias edge and one straight edge, the bias edge of the lining was turned under and neatly hand-hemmed down, as the photo below shows. The thread has either faded or never matched entirely.

Antique 1890s skirt showing hemmed lining.

An interesting feature of the lining is toward the bottom. The treatment of seams changes at 9 inches above the bottom of the skirt. Where the side panels meet each back panel, and at the center back, the lining has been cut such that there is a triangle -- a right triangle -- of lining butted up against the seam. Each of the seams in these lining bits is carefully hand-hemmed.

For how the bottom of the lining was treated, see the Brush Braid section below.

Antique 1890s skirt: triangular portions of the lining

The "Facing": What Costumers Might Call Interlining

In addition, at 9" above the hem, all the way around the inside of the skirt, there is a line of machine stitching. It shows only on the lining side, not on the fashion fabric side. The stitching is small, by the way, fine quality, perfectly straight machine stitching. No wobbly, cheap stitching here.

Ha! This stitching holds what Sophie Klug in her The Art of Dressmaking calls a facing, and what costumers might call an interlining (I will call it both here), 9 inches tall, that goes right the way round the skirt. The facing/interlining is only sewn to the lining, and not to the fashion fabric. I do not know how it was cut, and whether the facing/interlining pieces are as wide as each panel or not. The skirt is in good condition, and only in one little spot has the stitching at the base of the skirt come undone so that one can have a peek at the interlining itself. Here it is, below. It's coarsely woven. I cannot tell if it is buckram or some other fabric.

1890s antique skirt: facing/interlining peeking through small hole in the lining.

Let's let Sophie Klug describe what the facing/interlining is about and the extra stiffening, that she calls interlining, that can be added to it. I know it's long, but it explains how the facing and the interlining work together. (pp 30-31.)

"When the lining is ready, cut out the outside fabric and then the facing of linen canvas, haircloth, or cross-bar crinoline. The canvas and crinoline should both be cut bias, from five to fifteen inches wide and to fit around the bottom of the skirt. Where the latter is not in one piece, cut the facing to fit each section. The depth of this facing is ascertained by the prevailing fashion, or shape of the skirt being made. If the style requires an interlining of stiffening, the above facing is only put on five inches deep, it being otherwise nine to fifteen inches wide, according to one's fancy. Baste this across the bottom of the lining one-half inch from the lower edge of the skirt, and fasten to position by stitching with the machine across its top edge. When haircloth is used, the edges must be bound with some firm material to prevent the hair from gradually working through to the top surface.

If an interlining of stiffening is needed, there is for this purpose organdie, grass linen, moreen, fibre-chamois, haircloth, etc. The latter is often used for the back of skirts, while crinoline or fibre-chamois will be found quite sufficient for the front. This is chiefly done to lessen expense as only good haircloth should be employed. If the haircloth is to be entirely omitted use fibre-chamois throughout the whole skirt. (All haircloth should be shrunk before using.)

To join any of the above named linings lap the edges one over the other, and sew together with short basting stitches, the haircloth having strips of firm lining stitched over each seam....The stiffening is basted on the foundation after the canvas facing has been added and before the outside fabric is to be adjusted."

In the case of this antique skirt, there does not seem to be stiffening in addition to the facing/interlining, and I cannot tell how the top of it is handled -- if it has a cover over it to keep the horsehair in the haircloth from working through the lining or fashion fabric. What is there does seem to be cut on the bias, though.

What was this facing/interlining for? What I take from Sophie Klug is that the facing is a standard part of giving skirts the prevailing fashionable shape for the period. More stiffening -- an interlining -- becomes an extra measure for specific skirt styles. As we shall see in posts to come, this is an important point.

Brush Braid! Skirt Braid! Up Close and Personal

If you look at the picture of the interlining just above, you will notice that the lining edge is not raw: it has been folded under. That's key.

How the bottom of the skirt was constructed is efficient. The lining was turned under. The fashion fabric was turned in. Then brush braid, which during the period was often called skirt braid, was hand-sewn inside the skirt over those two turned-in edges. That brush braid finished the skirt in one go, so far as I can tell. I do not see any evidence of stitching either on the fashion fabric outside or the lining inside, other than the stitches holding down the braid.

I could be wrong -- there could be stitching there -- but I believe that this one-stitching-does-multiple-jobs is reflective of the skirt construction as a whole. Remember that the selvage of the fashion fabric is used in finishing the placket. Where the selvage edge of the lining can line up with a seam, there is no hemming, just the seam stitching. This skirt is made well, but with a minimum of stitching. It has all been thought out in advance.

What does the brush braid look like? Have a look below. Here is the brush end of the braid, It is fat and full and fuzzy. It would protect the hem of the skirt from wear.

1890s antique skirt: brush braid view

The brush braid was made like much passementerie is, with one edge as the visible edge, while the other edge is woven like a tape and is made to be either invisible, as in the case of passementerie trims that feature, say, a corded edge used on a cushion, with the interior, tape-like section sandwiched in between the cushion pieces and sewn there tightly as part of the cushion seam. In this case, the tape edge of the brush braid faces up into the body of the skirt. The braid is stitched to the fashion fabric and lining through this tape edge.

1890s antique skirt, inside and outside edges of the brush braid.

Every Woman's Encyclopaedia (1910-1912) defined skirt braid/brush braid -- and skirt binding -- this way.

Skirt Braid And Binding

These are used for preserving the edge of walking skirts. The ordinary plain worsted braid can be had in any colour, and costs from 1/2d. per yard. Another kind is brush braid, but the appearance is not so good, as it makes the skirt look "frayed."

Velveteen binding is sometimes used instead of braid to preserve the bottom of a skirt, which it should match in colour, and if the binding is prepared at home, strips of velveteen should be cut perfectly on the cross of the width desired (from 1 1/4 to 3 inches), the strips being neatly joined together.

N.B. - The method of cutting and joining strips of material on the cross is given in the second lesson on tailoring... Velvet binding or skirt facing can be bought ready cut in black and all colours from 1 1/2d. per yard, or Is. 5 1/2d. per dozen yards, according to the width.

Brush braid came in other versions, too. Here is a version that appears to be a thick cotton braid.

The marketing is such fun:

Why Is the Lady Happy? Because she has discovered Feder's Pompadour Skirt Protector.

And...

A Shake and...Dust Is Off; a Rub and Its Clean [sic]

Feder's Skirt Braid from Annie's Antiques on Etsy.

Given the hair and hat style of the lady illustrated on the reel, this is an 1890s product.

Skirt braid from Annie's Antiques

As you can see, protecting the bottom of a skirt hem could be achieved in several different ways, by both using a braid and by binding the bottom edge.

Inventors took out patents for various types of improved braids. Here is a page from a patent, US626397A, taken out in 1898 for a brush braid/skirt braid by F. Thun and H. Janssen. You can see the tape part of the braid and the brush-like part in the diagram.



Thun-Jannsen skirt braid patent image.

Another patent, US758564A, applied for in 1903, is a tape partially thickened. The patent carefully describes how skirt braids operate and how the patent braid is an improvement.

How skirt braid/brush braid was attached varied, too. You've already seen how it was done on this skirt. An 1896 sewing guide titled The Elements of Modern Dressmaking for the Amateur and Professional Dressmakerby Miss E.J. Davis discussed various ways of applying skirt braid, historical and suggested, but emphasizing putting the braid in between a skirt lining, facing and the skirt fabric. It makes interesting reading, as the methods differ from that seen on this skirt. See also suggested binding a skirt with velveteen, much as "Every Woman's Encyclopedia" did over a decade later. Sophie Klug's The Art of Dressmaking also discusses the subject at length; see chapter 9, "Skirts".

Obtaining skirt braid/brush braid today is difficult, to say the least. However, I'd go for a plain tape or cotton braid, though I would dye it to the color of the skirt, because it could easily show. Alternatively, the skirt edge can be bound with velveteen, as suggested by Miss Davis, along with Sophie Klug.

That concludes the tour of what is to me a lovely and most interesting skirt. The fabric, the lines, the efficient and well-handled construction...it's both pretty to look at and good to learn from! Had my own 1890s-style skirt been lined, I would have taken pointers from how this one was done. I hope that those of you considering making such a skirt may find these notes useful, too.