This 18th-Century Woman Owned 100 Gowns!

How many gowns did an eighteenth-century woman own? Join Dr Serena Dyer to meet Barbara Johnson, a genteel Georgian woman who very helpfully compiled a record of every gown that she had made for her between the ages of 8 and her 80s.

00:00 Introduction
01:51 Barbara Johnson
03:48 Who Was Barbara Johnson?
06:00 Why did she make an album?
11:19 What does the album tell us?
12:25 So, how many gowns did she really have?

To view Barbara Johnson's album on the V&A website: https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O1...

To buy my book, Material Lives: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Material-Liv...

To buy a second-hand copy of Barbara Johnson's album: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Album-Fashio...

Follow me elsewhere:
📷 Instagram: @dressing.history
✍Twitter: @Serena_Dyer
💻Website: www.serenadyer.co.uk

Images
Barbara Johnson’s Album, Victoria and Albert Museum
Ms. Roll 1594, University of Pennsylvania Libraries
Lincoln Archives
Portrait of a Young Girl by Sir William Beechey
Lewis Vaslet, The Spoiled Child, 1802
Alexander Grigorievich Varnek Anciana, 1813, Museo de Arte del Lejano Oriente, Geneva
Gown, 1740, Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1995.235a, b
Gown, 1785, Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1976.146a, b

Music: Epidemic Sound