Dress as Biography

An exploration of the ways dress and dressed appearance have been used to express identity.

Dress as Biography looks at the way clothing and dressed appearance contribute to a deep and empathetic understanding of an individual's life.

Scholarly writing on dress and identity primarily focuses on dress as an articulation of collective social identities – gender, sexuality, subcultures, ethnicity – with relatively little in-depth attention paid to dress as an expression of the individual. Alongside analysis of social identities, this book explores how appearance can be read as an indicator of an individual’s character and self-identity, while revealing many aspects of their life’s circumstances.

With 10 chapters written by leading specialists in their fields, Dress as Biography takes an interdisciplinary approach, exploring the subject through art history, material culture, and literature. With topics ranging from the 16th-century Elizabethan courtier Robert Dudley to the 20th-century graphic artist and writer, Polly Binder, from the "orphaned" clothes of a 1950s anonymous Londoner to Charles and Ray Eames’ fashion choices, the book considers biography through socialisation, feminism, and Black lives.

This multi-authored collection builds upon and adds new stimulus to the study of dress, biography and identity, examining how close analysis of the dressed appearance creates a fresh, innovative contribution to an understanding of the individual.