The Women Who Clothed the Stuart Queens

Gender and Work in the Royal Wardrobe and the Fashion Marketplace

Sarah A. Bendall

• Publisher: Bloomsbury Visual Arts
• Year: 2026
• Edition: 1
• eBook ISBN:
  9781350407367
• Topic: Conception
• Subtopic: Stylisme

This study explores – for the first time – the changing professions and roles of the women who worked to clothe six Stuart queens between 1603–1714: Anna of Denmark, Henrietta Maria, Catherine of Braganza, Mary of Modena, Queen Mary II and Queen Anne.

Beautifully illustrated in full colour throughout, and using a wide range of written, visual and material sources, this book explores how changing patterns of work and consumption saw women become key producers, retailers and consumers of fashion during the 17th century, and illuminates the strong connections between the royal courts and London's fashion marketplace.

From royal wardrobes, workrooms and laundries to workshops and retail premises in London's bustling streets, Sarah A. Bendall highlights the integral role that women of multiple backgrounds played in the creation and maintenance of elite dress. The royal accounts show that this work was facilitated by migration, global trade, familial networks and changing guild structures, and that the patronage of queens and elite women was integral to supporting and promoting women's rise in the fashion trades as celebrated silkwomen, tirewoman, milliners and mantua makers.

The Women Who Clothed the Stuart Queens challenges understandings of women's work in the court, the household and the fashion marketplace, and shows how clothing played a key role in women's economic participation in 17th and 18th-century England more broadly. It offers fascinating insights for all those interested in the history of women and gender, fashion, material culture and consumption, and, of course, to all those interested in Stuart history.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Contents
• List of Tables
• Acknowledgements
• Notes to the Reader
• Abbreviations
• Introduction: ‘She craveth allowance’
• 1 Wearing: The Stuart queens and elite fashions in the long seventeenth century
• 2 Managing: The Office of the Robes and the work of the Mistress of the Robes
• 3 Selling: Fashion retailers, milliners and their social networks
• 4 Making: Seamstresses, silkwomen and the rise of the mantua-maker
• 5 Caring: Maintaining clothing and appearances in the care economy of the royal household
• Conclusion: Women’s patronage and women’s work
• Appendix I: Makers and suppliers to the Stuart queens
• Appendix II: Clothing and accessories of the Stuart queens
• Appendix III: A list of Queen Mary II’s jewels, 1695
• Appendix IV: Debts owed to Robert and Elizabeth Graydon, 1701
• Glossary of clothing, textile and sewing terms
• Image credits
• Notes
• Bibliography
• Index
• Copyright