Victorian dress, the dress of more than sixty years, is not a single fashion but a sequence of styles, each evolving gradually from the preceding style, catching and reflecting changes in art and society. The shaping of dress, the covering outdoor garments, the concealed undergarments, the fabrics used in the making of dress and all its accessories together make the pattern of change. All these aspects of dress, together with briefer sections on men's dress and children's dress, are dealt with in this book. The author's experience as Keeper of one of the major collections of costume in the country, The Gallery of English Costume, Platt Hall, Manchester, gave her unrivalled qualifications for writing a work of this kind and it has long been a standard work on the period.