Forbidden Fashions: Invisible Luxuries in Early Venetian Convents
Form-fitting dresses, silk veils, earrings, furs, high-heeled shoes, make up, and dyed, flowing hair. It is difficult for a contemporary person to reconcile these elegant clothes and accessories with the image of cloistered nuns. For many of the some thousand nuns in early modern Venice, however, these fashions were the norm.
    Often locked in convents without any religious calling—simply to save their parents the expense of their dowry—these involuntary nuns relied on the symbolic meaning of secular clothes, fabrics, and colors to rebel against the rules and prescriptions of conventual life and to define roles and social status inside monastic society.
    Calling upon mountains of archival documents, most of which have never been seen in print, Forbidden Fashions is the first book to focus specifically upon the dress of nuns in Venetian convents and offers new perspective on the intersection of dress and the city’s social and economic history.
1114862989
Forbidden Fashions: Invisible Luxuries in Early Venetian Convents
Form-fitting dresses, silk veils, earrings, furs, high-heeled shoes, make up, and dyed, flowing hair. It is difficult for a contemporary person to reconcile these elegant clothes and accessories with the image of cloistered nuns. For many of the some thousand nuns in early modern Venice, however, these fashions were the norm.
    Often locked in convents without any religious calling—simply to save their parents the expense of their dowry—these involuntary nuns relied on the symbolic meaning of secular clothes, fabrics, and colors to rebel against the rules and prescriptions of conventual life and to define roles and social status inside monastic society.
    Calling upon mountains of archival documents, most of which have never been seen in print, Forbidden Fashions is the first book to focus specifically upon the dress of nuns in Venetian convents and offers new perspective on the intersection of dress and the city’s social and economic history.
34.95 In Stock
Forbidden Fashions: Invisible Luxuries in Early Venetian Convents

Forbidden Fashions: Invisible Luxuries in Early Venetian Convents

by Isabella Campagnol
Forbidden Fashions: Invisible Luxuries in Early Venetian Convents

Forbidden Fashions: Invisible Luxuries in Early Venetian Convents

by Isabella Campagnol

Hardcover(1)

$34.95 
  • SHIP THIS ITEM
    Qualifies for Free Shipping
  • PICK UP IN STORE
    Check Availability at Nearby Stores

Related collections and offers


Overview

Form-fitting dresses, silk veils, earrings, furs, high-heeled shoes, make up, and dyed, flowing hair. It is difficult for a contemporary person to reconcile these elegant clothes and accessories with the image of cloistered nuns. For many of the some thousand nuns in early modern Venice, however, these fashions were the norm.
    Often locked in convents without any religious calling—simply to save their parents the expense of their dowry—these involuntary nuns relied on the symbolic meaning of secular clothes, fabrics, and colors to rebel against the rules and prescriptions of conventual life and to define roles and social status inside monastic society.
    Calling upon mountains of archival documents, most of which have never been seen in print, Forbidden Fashions is the first book to focus specifically upon the dress of nuns in Venetian convents and offers new perspective on the intersection of dress and the city’s social and economic history.

Product Details

ISBN-13: 9780896728295
Publisher: Texas Tech University Press
Publication date: 01/15/2014
Series: Costume Society of America Series
Edition description: 1
Pages: 160
Product dimensions: 5.90(w) x 8.10(h) x 1.20(d)

About the Author

Isabella Campagnol, a dress, textile, and decorative arts historian, is the co-editor of Rubelli: A Story of Venetian Silk. She has lectured on the topics of Venice and Venetian textiles in Italy and Europe and the United States. She lives between Murano and Rome.

Table of Contents

Illustrations xi

Acknowledgments xiii

Abbreviations xv

Introduction 3

Chapter 1 Maridar o Monacar, To Marry or to Become a Nun? Nuptial Strategies in the Venetian Aristocracy 11

Chapter 2 Weddings and Clothings: A Comparison 24

Brides 24

Political and Symbolic Marriages: The Doge and the Abbesses of the Monastero delle Vergini 34

Sponsa Christi 36

Chapter 3 Nuns and Fashion 51

Religious Habits… 51

…And Forbidden Fashions 57

Beauty Secrets 85

Carnival: Masks, Disguises, and Theatrical Costumes for Nuns 91

Converse, Donne delle Monache, and Foreign Nuns 99

Almost Nuns: Soccorse, Widows, Pizzocchere, and Orphans 103

Chapter 4 Textiles, Embroideries, and Laces in the Convent 112

Lacework in Venice: A Brief Outline 113

Invisible Seamstresses 115

Cloistered, but Secular, Seamstresses 119

Chapter 5 Conclusions 122

Appendices 125

Notes 157

Glossary 201

Bibliography 205

Index 219

From the B&N Reads Blog

Customer Reviews