Charlotte Brontë’s Barège Dress

Eleanor Houghton, Charlotte Brontë’s Barège Dress, Pen and ink with watercolour, 2021
 
This gown was made in Halifax in 1854 as part of Charlotte’s wedding trousseau. The dress is now in fragments as, after the author’s death, it was cut up to send out as mementoes to relic hunters. It is made from a spotted barège, a fine woollen warp and silk weft fabric that became hugely popular amongst fashionable ladies in the 1850s.