Ensemble

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Featured here is a well-documented boy's ensemble, worn by William Henry Eaves for a portrait in 1856, when he was near age three. The portrait is currently in the Brooklyn Museum collection. An elaborate costume like this may well have been made specifically for the portrait and not worn for any other occasion. Another version of this ensemble, which is made of more durable and comfortable material, shows evidence of considerable wear which supports the notion that this version was intended only for show. The ensemble expresses the ideal representation of a child in a middle-class American family of the time.

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