Australian Penal Colony Fashion

Fashion has changed in everything but name over the last 126 years. What was once the special preserve of the privileged few has become a happy hunting ground for all.

Long-treasured traditions of handcraftsmanship have been superseded by large-scale manufacture primed with growing expertise and catering for all areas of the consumer market. Fashion is no longer dictated by high society or by European couturiers; as often as not it is triggered off and swept into favour by the anonymous but compulsive force of the street.

What hasn't changed is that it is news. It has always been well documented, and it moves under a constant floodlight of publicity. Fashion is for all. Couturiers, specialty shops, department stores, boutiques and chain stores all offer fashion. Carrying fashion news in newspapers and magazines is a tradition which has continued since newspapers were first printed. Advertising has become a sophisticated technique, extending to television and radio as well as printed media.

Attitudes to clothes and the way they are worn have differed throughout the last century in one fundamental way. Since 1900 there has been a steady reduction in the actual amount of clothing worn - for men, women and children.  There is little to distinguish Australian dress from that adopted in other Western countries. The interest lies in where and how it varies.

The gold rush of the late 1850s and the early 1860s heralded a new prosperity in Australia. With the change in circumstances came a change in the fashions of the day.

Crinolines lost their symmetrical shape and swept their bulk to the back. Little hats replaced the bonnet and the Garibaldi jacket became very popular. Hair followed the shape of the skirt and was held up in a bun at the nape of the neck by a chenille net.

In the country areas, French Merino dresses made with highset long sleeves, worn with white pinafores, little cloth jackets and brown felt hats were the norm. For men around this time, flannel shirts and moleskins prevailed as work clothes.

For the inner-city male, the mode of dress was more stuffy and very quickly became increasingly drab: a frock coat or morning coat was worn with top hat and mutton-chop whiskers.

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