Les Modes Parisiennes [complete set of fashion plates from Peterson's Magazine, collected edition]

Philadelphia: Peterson's Magazine, 1881. Very good. 9" x 11" (23 x 28 cm). Twelve single, unbound fold-out plates, one for each month of 1881, of the latest Paris fashions. Colored engravings of five women modeling dresses and accessories, sometimes with children or background figures, in various scenes and activities. Individually titled: Jan. "The Snowy Day," Feb. "The New Picture," Mar. "The Painted Dress," Apr. "Feeding the Swans," May "The Croquet Party," June "The Private Park," July "The Garden Party," Aug. "At Home," Sept. "The Antique Gateway," Oct. "On the Boulevard," Nov. "At Home for Calls," Dec. "The Opera Box." Printed on lightweight, somewhat frail paper. General edge wear, some foxing and splitting along folds. April, May and November have tape repair to verso with November missing some material along fold tear. "Originally published as Ladies’ National Magazine in 1842 by Saturday Evening Post partners, Charles Jacobs Peterson and George Rex Graham, the periodical emerged as a cheaper alternative within the hugely popular market of women’s magazines. The publication continued as Peterson’s Ladies’ National Magazine, and then simply Peterson’s Magazine, until 1892. With a focus on the domestic and consumer lives of middle-class white women, the pages of Peterson’s featured fashion, embroidery patterns, sheet music, engravings, poetry, short stories, serialized fiction, recipes, remedies, housekeeping advice, puzzles, and more. While the content of the women’s magazine emphasized the woman’s role as centered on her family, as a wife, mother, and keeper of the household, the publication of Peterson’s, and other women’s magazines, created professional opportunities outside the home for women writers and editors."Peterson’s featured bound-in, colored French fashion plates. These beautiful works of art are noteworthy inclusions of the magazine, displaying the 19th century feminine ideal. Despite the impracticality of many of these designs for the varying lifestyles of women, Peterson’s French fashion plates, as well as the other garment illustrations in the magazine, are reflective of the styles worn by the women of the 1880s." (Wylie House Museum News and Notes, Indiana University)