Cinderella: Part II

As promised, today's post will look at Cinderella's father and Lady Tremaine.  Having established that the film's opening takes place between the years 1850 and 1860, I began to delve into source material from the period.
Beginning with his top half, Cinderella's father is wearing brown, single-breasted tails with a low-cut teal vest.  Whilst researching, I came across information suggesting that men's suits from the period were most commonly black.  It was thought that avoiding ornamentation and gaudy patterns allowed the women's dresses to stand out.  After repeatedly striking out, I began to suspect that the animator took certain liberties with regards to color.  After all, black is less interesting, and would cause the lines of the outfit to blend together.  Then, I found this:

1840s suit on display at LA Country Museum of Art.

Single breasted brown tails with gold buttons and wide lapels!  It's uncanny!  This suit is from the 1840's, slightly earlier than the period previously established, but totally believable that he would still wear an older suit he had (whilst the children's dresses are more stylish since they would have been new).  Vests were a must during this century, and existed in almost every cut and style:

From the 1840's to 1860's, brightly colored men's vests experienced popularity, so the teal vest is in keeping with the period.  I love that it compliments young Cinderella's vest!  A cravat was a must for mid-century gentleman, and they were made of black or colored fabric.  Like the vest they were tied every which way:

A set of instructions regarding cravat-tieing.

A photo from the period.

Trousers from the period were slim and expertly tailored:

Father could have done with a stove-pipe!  This fashion plate shows men sporting mutton chops and mustaches, like the character.  If they weren't wearing hats, you would see that their hair is allowed to grow a little long and worn with minimal styling:

What a dreamboat!

Lady Tremaine proves much trickier.  She wears an Edwardian high-necked day dress that gives her an hourglass shape.  It has long sleeves, reaches the ground and has leg-of-mutton sleeves.  The dress is made with a v-shaped waistline.

Up until this point,  the character's costumes have been, for the most part, historically accurate, albeit caricatured somewhat in order to serve the story.  I did not find this to be the case when researching the influences of Lady Tremaine's day gown.

Whilst the girl's dresses very clearly fit in the early Crinoline period, Tremaine's gown does not.  Thus I began researching the Romantic period, which precedes the Crinoline period.

The most distinguishing feature of the gown are the leg-of-mutton, or gigot, sleeves.  These were popular during the romantic period.  Thus, I assumed, like the others, that all the other characteristics of the getup would fall right into the period, as had happened with the other characters.  Nope.  The more images I looked at, the less I saw of what I was looking for.  I saw pages and pages of this:

And this:

And this:

Ok. So the last one fits, kinda, but for the most part, the gigot sleeves from the period were much larger than Tremaine's and gathered up and down the arm with bows and ribbons.  I could not find one image that reference either a high neck or v-shaped waist (neckline's were primarily boat shaped and waistlines were straight across the natural waistline).  Whilst Tremaine's gown does give her an hourglass figure, it is not as exaggerated as dresses from the Romantic period.

Which leads to the question:  What period does Tremaine belong in.

There is one other period in which the leg-of-mutton sleeve experienced popularity: the Gay 90's.  Here is some reference from the period:

Need I say more? I think it's clear that Tremaine's dress is much more reminiscent of the 1890's than the 1830's.  The question is... why?  Perhaps the animator thought the fashion from the Romantic period too sweet (think Jane Austen), but wanted to retain at least the most distinguishing feature from the period (the leg-of-mutton).  Whilst not historically accurate, I'm inclined to agree.