Victorian Boys' Clothes

Normally, I don't think or write about clothes. Yes, they can be interesting to look at, but on the whole, I am of the opinion they are just there to keep you from being naked.

That said, I found this dress here, and according to the description, this dress is for a young boy. I started to think about it, and it really does make sense. Clothes were hard to make and clean, diapers had to be changed, and it would be easier to lengthen a dress for a growing child than to sew them a new pair of pants every few months.

A bit more searching brought me to these young gents: who are clearly ecstatic. They look to be between four and seven years of age, so the elder boy probably was "breeched," or allowed to wear long pants not long after this picture was taken. Assuming his mama was willing to relinquish her hold on his apparel. But may she was okay with it, since she still had the younger sibling to fuss over for a few years yet.

We all know who this tot is, even though we can't see his companion. Young Christopher served as his father's model for his books. He was dressed in gingham smocks until he had passed his 8th birthday. This was, however, unusual. When he went off to his boarding school, the other boys teased him for it.

This wasn't the first time a writer used their child as a model for a story. Francis Hodgson Burnett s young son, Vivian, was the model for Little Lord Fauntleroy. The fashion craze this generated was based off of the illustrations that were done from photos of young Vivian.

This isn't Vivian, but an illustration of the outfit that had to have been the bane of the existence of at least two generations of young boys.

Though it may seem silly to our modern eyes, and for some clothing historians, it is hard to tell the boys and girls apart, there were some, at first, practical reasons for dressing young boys in this manner. And I'm sure a vast majority of the boys turned out just fine.