Robe à la française

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

"With the spring," noted Mrs. Eric Pritchard in The Cult of Chiffon (1902), "comes naturally enough a tendency towards bright shades, seeing that `all the world is young,' and the buds are bursting forth into bloom; consequently tender tones of greens, yellows, pinks, and blues most strongly appeal to us. ... in the days when skies are blue and grass is green, we cast behind us the gloomy and cold tones of winter." Spring's irrepressible generosity is suggested in floral pattern echoed in the fly fringe's "virtual" flora.

The Costume Institute

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Costume Institute's collection of more than thirty-three thousand objects represents seven centuries of fashionable dress and accessories for men, women, and children, from the fifteenth century to the present.

Metropolitan Museum of Art