I have had a deep interest in death customs throughout history and around the world for a long time now, so when I found this fabric (designed by Tim Holtz) I was very interested in it! This print has Victorian ads for a variety of death and funeral-related businesses, including Druggists, Undertakers, Florists, and Embalmers. I found this fabric really fascinating because the Victorian era had many specific and unique death practices, and many that have continued until this day in western culture.
Before the Victorian era, the Americas had a huge variety of death customs. There are so many different customs from Indigenous cultures that were often suppressed by colonialists through laws and other means. Each of these traditions and customs had, and continue to have, enormous meaning to the cultures that practice them. I am in no means an expert on this subject, but many have written and researched it in the past - I highly reccommend The Order of the Good Death website as a resource for well written books and documentaries on the subject of death practices.
There were other types of death practices before the Victorian era in the Americas, especially with immigrants from different countries starting to arrive. Even as the Victorian era began, many cultures brought their beliefs and traditions to this part of the world. There were beautiful cultural death practices that were brought from China, India, Eastern Europe, and other countries around the world. For many of these cultures, spending time with the body of the deceased was important. So many cultures have placed importance on touching and spending time with the body with other loved ones after a death. No matter what is traditionally done with the deceased member (some culture bury their dead, others put them high up and close to the sky, others leave them for the animals, some cultures live with their dead among their community), there is very often great significance placed on loved ones taking care of the body themselves, giving them time to grieve and let go.
However, during the Victorian era we start to see a shift in western thought surrounding dead bodies. With new medical science being discovered (and new pseudo-sciences being "discovered") and the rise in deaths through the American Civil War, the funeral industry began. The Civil War lead to the invention of embalming, since it allowed for the bodies of soldiers who died far away from their home to be sent back to their families. Undertakers and embalmers took advantage of some of these new inventions and embalming eventually became a normal and 'essential' part of the death practice. This is obviously a very simplified account and others have spoken about this time in history at far greater length and with more elegance than I have (check here for great books to read on the subject, and I always suggest that everyone watch some of Caitlyn Doughty's videos at Ask a Mortician on Youtube), but I think that is it so important to think about where our traditions have come from.
I would love to write more on the subject, but that would require a great deal more research than I currently have the energy for (I am starting to prepare for the fall semester of university and my day job at an archive is fantastic but can be pretty tiring on the brain), so this will have to do for the time being. If you take anything away from this short little introduction to American death practices I would ask that you spend a little time thinking about the importance of death practices and what you feel would be important to you for your own body. I know this seems like a morbid path to go down, but it is so important to think about ahead of time so your family knows what kind of death practices and traditions that you find important.
I will end my morbid little blogpost with some quick information about the actual dress - this dress was made using a 1930s reproduction pattern out of a cotton print. It has the cutest puff sleeves with an interesting box pleat detail, a front yoke, peter pan collar, gentle A-line skirt, and gathering at the waist and bust. I love the dress, although when I make this pattern again I will be sure to cut out the size up, since this dress is a bit snug.
Thank you for reading!
~Katherine
