Sack-back gown

Robe à la française, France, block-printed cotton, c. 1770. Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) M.2007.211.718

The sack-back gown or robe à la française was a women's fashion of the 18th century. At the beginning of the century, the sack-back gown was a very informal style of dress. By the 1770s it was second only to court dress in its formality. This style of gown had fabric at the back arranged in box pleats which fell loose from the shoulder to the floor with a slight train. In front, the gown was open, showing off a decorative stomacher and petticoat. It would have been worn with a wide square hoop or panniers under the petticoat. Scalloped ruffles often trimmed elbow-length sleeves, which were worn with separate frills called engageantes.The Robe à la française or saque gown was also worn with Pannier Pocket hoops ,a smaller version of panniers.

Gallery

• 

  L'Enseigne de Gersaint (detail), 1720, by Antoine Watteau. Early example of a sack-back gown.

• 

  Robe à la française of pale green shot silk and embroidered stomacher, 1725-1745, LACMA M.2007.211.927a-b and M.2007.211.126.

• 

  Robe à la française, Netherlands, silk satin brocaded with silk and metallic threads, 1740-60. LACMA M.2007.211.928

• 

  Eleanor Frances Dixie, c. 1753, by Henry Pickering. The sitter is wearing a bergère hat and a brocaded silk sack-back gown.

• 

  Anastasia Ivanovna, Countess of Hesse-Homburg, Princess Trubetskaya (1700–1755), painted by Alexander Roslin, wearing a pink silk sack-back gown and petticoat. 1757.

• 

  Robe a la française, England, silk plain weave (faille) with silk and metallic-thread supplementary-weft patterning, trimmed with metallic lace, c. 1765. LACMA M.2007.211.929a-d

• 

  Robe a la française, England, silk satin with weft-float patterning and silk passementerie, c. 1765. LACMA M.79.19.1

• 

  Sack-back gown and petticoat, 1775–1780 V&A Museum no. T.180&A-1965

• 

  Sack-back gown and petticoat, 1775–1780, back view. V&A Museum no. T.180&A-1965

See also

• 1700–1750 in fashion
• 1750–1795 in fashion

Bibliography

• Arnold, Janet. Patterns of Fashion 1: Englishwomen's dresses & their construction c. 1660–1860. Drama Publishers, 1977. ISBN 089676026X
• Burnston, Sharon Ann. Fitting and Proper: 18th Century Clothing from the Collection of the Chester County Historical Society. Scurlock Pub Co, 2000. ISBN 1880655101
• Hart, Avril, and Susan North. Seventeenth and Eighteenth-Century Fashion in Detail. V&A Publishing, 2009. ISBN 1851775676
• Jackson, Anna (ed.) (2001). V&A: A Hundred Highlights. V&A Publications. 
• Ribeiro, Aileen: The Art of Dress: Fashion in England and France 1750–1820, Yale University Press, 1995, ISBN 0-300-06287-7
• Ribeiro, Aileen: Dress in Eighteenth Century Europe 1715–1789, Yale University Press, 2002, ISBN 0-300-09151-6

External links

• 18th Century Robes à la Française
• How to Make a Contouche, also known as sack back dress, saque, or robe à la française