Sleeve supports

Unknown

1890s · cotton · Costume Institute

The inflated sleeves of the 1830s and the 1890s were augmented by a variety of supports, either worn as underpinnings or incorporated into the structure of the sleeves themselves. Sleeve supports were frequently down-filled pillows, but chintz with ribs of wire or cane was also used to make somewhat airier lantern-like forms. Although impressive in mass, the earlier sleeve puffs did not disrupt the line of the shoulder. Instead, because they were poised so precariously on the upper arm, the sleeve's outline simply continued in a descending line from the shoulder. It was only in the 1890s that giant puffed sleeves obtruded above the line of the newly squared shoulder.

Artist

Unknown

Date

1890s

Medium

cotton

Culture

American or European

Department

Costume Institute

Credit line

Gift of Miss Jessie Rosenfeld, 1943