Comfortable Corset

Comfortable Corset

The item from The Ladies’ World titled “The Perfect Poise” is an advertisement about a corset from the brand Ferris Waist. The Ferris Waist corset enables a woman to ride either her bicycle, horse, or play a sport with “easy grace” because every muscle is “absolutely free”. The audience for this specific item is clearly women, but not necessarily from the upper class because the prices for these corsets range from 50 cents to $2.75. During this time there was a great distinction between the rich and poor, and I doubt that a woman from the upper-class would spend so little in a corset. This magazine depicts New York of the 1850’s because it serves as an example to demonstrate that magazines no longer aimed at the upper well-educated class and rather had shifted to a new type of audience. This new type of audience could afford magazines because it was cheaper to print paper. The creator of the item really wanted to sell the corset and was willing to say anything to increase profit. For example, it says that the corset is constructed with elastic sides which eliminates restriction and allows the woman to move freely. I am not sure to what extent this is true because the purpose of a corset is to have everything stay in place and not move. Also, these new magazines of 1850’s had an emphasis on the current time’s issues. For instance, the woman in the image is conveyed to be enjoying riding her bike around the city. She is not depicted in a house, but rather in the streets. This is a clear distinction between the private and public spheres. Also, this serves to demonstrate the immigration movement and how magazines informed immigrant women about certain expectations in fashion in order to adjust to the New York life-style. Thus, the woman in the picture could be understood as the ideal women in NYC in 1850’s.

Ferris Waist

The Perfect Poise. Advertisement. The Ladies’ World. May, 1990. Print

11/2/2015

Antonella Rozas

1900