Clothes emphasized gender norms.
Australian National Maritime Museum on The Commons/Wikimedia Commons
Australian National Maritime Museum on The Commons/Wikimedia Commons
Women’s fashion of the era was designed to emphasize modesty and elegance, which helps to explain why Victorian women’s clothing was often elaborate while covering most of the body.
Men’s fashion, meanwhile, was subdued, emphasizing crisp suits and top hats — shades of which we still see today in modern formal fashion. The invention of the sewing machine in 1846 by Elias Howe helped make both men’s and women’s fashion more accessible to the masses.