The Colonial Commodity of Knock-Off Cashmere
The import and mass-market replicas of the Kashmiri shawl highlighted Victorian anxieties about empire and its role in industrial modernity.
Fashion’s Flaws
Environmental historian Adam Rome considers the destructive history of fashion and style.
Reasons for Re-Enacting at the Renaissance Faire
Why do we love donning period costumes and re-enacting our history through mock battles, pioneer villages, and Renaissance Faires?
The Art of Renaissance Clothes
While Spanish Catholicism and reformatory Protestantism favored black clothing, much of the Renaissance happened in an explosion of color.
Paris’s Wild Costume Balls
As urban growth brought rich and poor Parisians closer together in the 1830s, masked balls encouraged class mixing and costumes that crossed gender lines.
The Existentialism of Style vs. Substance
Camus, Sartre, and Beauvoir were misread, misunderstood, and misperceived by English-speaking readers due to interventions of publishers and editors.
Versatile Velcro™
Velcro is used in many spaces, from spacecraft to shoes. A relatively recent invention, it was inspired by the close observation of nature.
The Complicated History of Pointy Hats
What do sorcerers, bishops, and garden gnomes all have in common? Pointy hats that share a common story deeply enmeshed in European antisemitism.