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Labyrinth (1986) blinkies and stamps

~ Alexandre Cabanel, Patricienne de Venise (1881) (detail)

In 1842, South Avon bride Julia Bassman wore an extraordinary corset for her wedding: one decorated with padded quilting around the bust and hip gores and in discrete foliate motifs around the waist. Her name, location, and the year are written directly onto the fabric.

It's also very interesting because of its flimsiness. Most corsets of the era are made of cotton sateen, a fairly sturdy fabric, and have a significant amount of cording or strength quilting (rows of parallel lines, or a grid). This one has an outer layer of thin linen and an inner layer of thin cotton, and the quilting here is almost entirely decorative. Apart from the busk, there's essentially no stiffening here. I would suppose that this comes down to a couple of things:

As I'm always saying, the cut of a corset does all of the work to shape a figure. It's not the boning. People think it's the boning but it's not.

A young woman might need minimal support to achieve the fashionable figure. I should measure the corset and see its exact dimensions, but it looks to be on the smaller side.

She may have decided that this was going to be a special garment that would only be worn once, so it didn't need to hold up to many or even multiple uses.

"friday night was supposed to be the straight night, and saturday night was supposed to be the gay night. but everybody went to every night. all the mothers’ children: the straight ones, the freaks, everybody in between. it was a place to go and dance and not be judged."

"at the garage, it was like stepping into a temple of music. the bass drum and voices were so crisp, clear, well-defined and powerful. it would change you forever."