Western fashion of men in 1795–1820

Fashion in the period 1795–1820 in European and European-influenced countries saw the final triumph of undress or informal styles over the brocades, lace, periwigs and powder of the earlier 18th century. In the aftermath of the French Revolution, no one wanted to appear to be a member of the French aristocracy, and people began using clothing more as a form of individual expression of the true self than as a pure indication of social status. As a result, the shifts that occurred in fashion at the turn of the 19th century granted the opportunity to present new public identities that also provided insights into their private selves. Katherine Aaslestad indicates how "fashion, embodying new social values, emerged as a key site of confrontation between tradition and change."

In Britain, Beau Brummell introduced trousers, perfect tailoring, and unadorned, immaculate linen as the ideals of men's fashion. In Germany, republican city-states relinquished their traditional, modest, and practical garments and started to embrace the French and English fashion trends of short-sleeved chemise dresses and Spencer jackets. American fashion trends emulated French dress, but in a toned down manner with shawls and tunics to cope with the sheerness of the chemise. However, in Spain, members of the Aristocracy, as well as citizens of the lower class, united and rebelled against French enlightenment ideals and fashion by dressing as majas and majos to contain their Spanish pride.

By the end of the eighteenth century, a major shift in fashion was taking place that extended beyond changes in mere style to changes in philosophical and social ideals. Prior to this time, the style and traditions of the “Ancien Régime” prevented the conceptualization of “the self”. Instead, one’s identity was considered malleable; subject to change depending on what clothes one was wearing. However, by the 1780s, the new, “natural” style allowed one’s inner self to transcend their clothes.

During the 1790s, there was a new concept of the internal and external self. Before this time, there had only been one self, which was expressed through clothing. When going to a masquerade ball, people wore specific clothing, so they could not show their individuality through their clothing. Since, for everyday dress, most people wore similar clothing, people used accessories to show their individuality. These accessories and the detail on the clothing were more important than the shape of the dress.

Incorporated in this new “natural” style was the importance of ease and comfort of one's dress. Not only was there a new emphasis on hygiene, but also clothing became much lighter and more able to be changed and washed frequently. Even upper class women began wearing cropped dresses as opposed to dresses with long trains or hoops that restricted them from leaving their homes. In a sense, women were influenced by male fashion, such as tailored waistcoats and jackets to emphasize women’s mobility. This new movement toward practicality of dress showed that dress became less of a way to solely categorize between classes or genders; dress was meant to suit one's personal daily routine. It was also during this time period that the fashion magazine and journal industry began to take off. They were most often monthly (often competing) periodicals that allowed men and women to keep up with the ever-changing styles.

Men's fashion

Overview
This period saw the final abandonment of lace, embroidery, and other embellishment from serious men's clothing outside of formalized court dress—it would not reappear except as an affectation of Aesthetic dress in the 1880s and its successor, the "Young Edwardian" look of the 1960s. Instead, cut and tailoring became much more important as an indicator of quality. This transformation can be attributed in part to an increased interest in antiquity stemming from the discovery of classical engravings, including the Elgin Marbles. The figures depicted in classical art were viewed as an exemplar of the ideal natural form, and an embodiment of Neoclassical ideas. Therefore, in the 18th century, dress was simplified and greater emphasis was put on tailoring to enhance the natural form of the body.

This was also the period of the rise of hair wax for styling men's hair, as well as mutton chops as a style of facial hair.

Breeches became longer—tightly fitted leather riding breeches reached almost to the boot tops—and were replaced by pantaloons or trousers for fashionable street wear. The French Revolution is largely responsible for altering standard male dress. During the revolution, clothing symbolized the division between the upper classes and the working class revolutionaries. French rebels earned the nickname sans-culottes, or "(the people without breeches," because of the loose floppy trousers they popularized.

Coats were cutaway in front with long skirts or tails behind, and had tall standing collars. Lapels were not as large as they had been in years before and often featured an M-shaped notch unique to the period.

Shirts were made of linen, had attached collars, and were worn with stocks or wrapped in a cravat tied in various fashions. Pleated frills at the cuffs and front opening went out of fashion by the end of the period.

Waistcoats were high-waisted, and squared off at the bottom, but came in a broad variety of styles. They were often double-breasted, with wide lapels and stand collars. Around 1805 large lapels that overlapped those of the jacket began to fall out of fashion, as did the 18th century tradition of wearing the coat unbuttoned, and gradually waistcoats became less visible. Shortly before this time waistcoats were commonly vertically striped but by 1810 plain white waistcoats were increasingly fashionable, as did horizontally striped waistcoats. High-collared waistcoats were fashionable until 1815, then collars were gradually lowered as the shawl collar came into use toward the end of this period.

Overcoats or greatcoats were fashionable, often with contrasting collars of fur or velvet. The garrick, sometimes called a coachman's coat, was a particularly popular style, and had between three and five short caplets attached to the collar.

Boots, typically Hessian boots with heart-shaped tops and tassels were mainstay in men's footwear. After the Duke of Wellington defeated Napoleon at Waterloo in 1815, Wellington boots, as they were known, became the rage; tops were knee-high in front and cut lower in back. The jockey boot, with a turned-down cuff of lighter colored leather, had previously been popular but continued to be worn for riding. Court shoes with elevated heels became popular with the introduction of trousers.

The rise of the dandy
The clothes-obsessed dandy first appeared in the 1790s, both in London and Paris. In the slang of the time, a dandy was differentiated from a fop in that the dandy's dress was more refined and sober. The dandy prided himself in "natural excellence" and tailoring allowed for exaggeration of the natural figure beneath fashionable outerwear.

In High Society: A Social History of the Regency Period, 1788–1830, Venetia Murray writes:

Other admirers of dandyism have taken the view that it is a sociological phenomenon, the result of a society in a state of transition or revolt. Barbey d'Aurevilly, one of the leading French dandies at the end of the nineteenth century, explained:

"Some have imagined that dandyism is primarily a specialisation in the art of dressing oneself with daring and elegance. It is that, but much else as well. It is a state of mind made up of many shades, a state of mind produced in old and civilised societies where gaiety has become infrequent or where conventions rule at the price of their subject's boredom...it is the direct result of the endless warfare between respectability and boredom."
In Regency London dandyism was a revolt against a different kind of tradition, an expression of distaste for the extravagance and ostentation of the previous generation, and of sympathy with the new mood of democracy.

Beau Brummell set the fashion for dandyism in British society from the mid-1790s, which was characterized by immaculate personal cleanliness, immaculate linen shirts with high collars, perfectly tied cravats, and exquisitely tailored plain dark coats (contrasting in many respects with the "maccaroni" of the earlier 18th century).

Brummell abandoned his wig and cut his hair short in a Roman fashion dubbed à la Brutus, echoing the fashion for all things classical seen in women's wear of this period. He also led the move from breeches to snugly tailored pantaloons or trousers, often light-colored for day and dark for evening, based on working-class clothing adopted by all classes in France in the wake of the Revolution. In fact, Brummel's reputation for taste and refinement was such that, fifty years after his death, Max Beerbohm, wrote:

In certain congruities of dark cloth, in the rigid perfection of his linen, in the symmetry of his glove with his hand, lay the secret of Mr Brummell's miracles.

Not every male aspiring to attain Brummel's sense of elegance and style succeeded, however, and these dandies were subject to caricature and ridicule. Venetia Murray quotes an excerpt from Diary of an Exquisite, from The Hermit in London, 1819:

Took four hours to dress; and then it rained; ordered the tilbury and my umbrella, and drove to the fives' court; next to my tailors; put him off after two years tick; no bad fellow that Weston...broke three stay-laces and a buckle, tore the quarter of a pair of shoes, made so thin by O'Shaughnessy, in St. James's Street, that they were light as brown paper; what a pity they were lined with pink satin, and were quite the go; put on a pair of Hoby's; over-did it in perfuming my handkerchief, and had to recommence de novo; could not please myself in tying my cravat; lost three quarters of an hour by that, tore two pairs of kid gloves in putting them hastily on; was obliged to go gently to work with the third; lost another quarter of an hour by this; drove off furiously in my chariot but had to return for my splendid snuff-box, as I knew that I should eclipse the circle by it.

Transformation of men´s fashion during a lifetime

1-1795	2-1820

1.Marquis de Lafayette (1757-1834) wearing a powdered wig tied in a queue that was a common piece of men´s dress by c. 1795.
2.Marquis de Lafayette depicted in later years of his life, dressed according to the fashion of 1820s.

Hairstyles and headgear
During this period, younger men of fashion began to wear their hair in short curls, often with long sideburns. In 1795, Pitt's hair powder tax effectively ended the fashion for wigs and powder, and new styles like the Brutus and the Bedford Crop became fashionable. Older men, military officers, and those in conservative professions such as lawyers, judges, physicians, and servants retained their wigs and powder. Formal court dress also still required powdered hair.

Tricorne and bicorne hats were still worn, but the most fashionable hat was tall and slightly conical; this would evolve into the top hat and reign as the only hat for formal occasions for the next century.

Style gallery 1795–1809

1 – c. 1800	2 – 1805	3 – 1805	4 – 1807	5 – 1808–09
6 – 1808	7 – 1809	8 – 1809	9 - 1800-1810	10 - 1808-09

1.Portrait of boxer "Jem" Belcher wearing a patterned cravat and a double-breasted brown coat with a dark (fur or velvet?) collar, c. 1800.
2.Watercolor of Beau Brummell by Richard Dighton.
3.In this self-portrait of 1805, Washington Allston wears a tan cravat with his high white collar and dark coat. Boston.
4.Rubens Peale wears a white waistcoat with a tall upright notched collar over his high shirt collar and wide cravat. America, 1807.
5.Friedrich von Schiller wears a brown double-breasted coat with a contrasting collar and brass buttons. The pleated frill of his shirt front can be seen next to the knot of his white cravat, Germany, 1808–09.
6.Chateaubriand has fashionably tousled hair. He wears a long redingote over his coat, tan waistcoat, white shirt and dark cravat, 1808.
7.Count Victor Kochubey's collar reaches his chin, and his cravat is wrapped around his neck and tied in a small bow. His short hair is casually dressed and falls over his forehead, 1809.
8.Portrait of Gwyllym Lloyd Wardle depicts him in a dark coat over a tan waistcoat and high collar and cravat, 1809.
9.Elaborate embroidery remained a feature of formal court suits like this one, which pairs a red wool coat with a cloth-of-silver waistcoat, both embroidered in silver thread. Italy, c. 1800-1810. Los Angeles County Museum of Art, M.80.60a-b.
10.Portrait of Danish adventurer Jørgen Jørgensen shows how Scandinavian society has viewed men's fashion in the Age of Revolution.

Style gallery 1810–1820

1 – 1810	2 – 1810	3 – 1812–13	4 – 1813	5 – 1815
6 – 1816	7 – 1817	8 – 1819

1.Les Modernes Incroyables, a satire on French fashions of 1810; long tight breeches or pantaloons, short coats with tails, and massive cravats.
2.Marcotte d'Argenteuil wears a high-collared shirt with a dark cravat, a buff waistcoat, a double-breasted brown coat with covered buttons, and a dark gray overcoat with contrasting collar (perhaps sealskin). 1810. His bicorne hat lies on the table.
3.Daniel la Motte, a Baltimore, Maryland, merchant and landowner, strikes a romantic pose that displays details of his white waistcoat, frilled shirt, and fall-front breeches with covered buttons at the knee, 1812–13.
4.German physician Johann Abraham Albers wears a striped waistcoat under a black double-breasted coat, 1813.
5.American artist Samuel Lovett Waldo wears a frilled shirt with a knotted white cravat.
6.Lord Grantham wears a double-breasted coat which shows a bit of the waistcoat beneath at the waist, tight pantaloons tucked into boots, and a high collar and cravat, 1816.
7.Nicolas-Pierre Tiolier wears a rich blue tailcoat and brown fall-front trousers over white waistcoat, shirt, and cravat. His tall hat sits on an antique plinth, 1817.
8.Unknown artist wears a double-breasted tail coat with turned-back cuffs and a matching high collar of velvet (or possibly fur). Note that, while the man's obvious wasp-like torso is not overly emphasized in a caricature-like fashion, as was often the case in male fashion plates of the day, there is a definite and deliberate nipping of the waist. It is highly likely that the sitter in this portrait wore some sort of tight-laced corset or similar undergarment. The coat-sleeves are puffed at the shoulder. He wears a white waistcoat, shirt, and cravat, and light-colored pantaloons, 1819.

Source from Wikipedia