What books would have influenced fashion choices for a lady of 1912? What dress advice would a "stout" lady have been given?

I love handbags. They are the cherry on the banana split of fashion ensembles. Like hats, they complete and complement your gown. Properly researched, they add credibility to your historic or vintage attire.

Two bags came into my hands a few years ago: two wristlet purses, artfully gathered and sewn onto the highly popular Bakelite bangles of the era. “Cheap, fast and easy” was a phrase applied to high-living flappers, but the same could be said of these bags aswell. I'll show you how to recreate them both.

‘Flowermaking is an art rather than a craft.’

Many of the techniques for making artifical flowers are simple. The effect, with some effort and practice, can be wonderful. They can either mimic real flowers or merely suggest them, conveying what G.I. Somerville calls ‘the form and feeling of a flower’ .

You've been asking us for more information about using color and line in clothing. In response, we have hit the library and consulted period texts in order to find you the most relevant (and entertaining!) information directly from history.

In this excerpted chapter from Color Harmony in Dress, by George Ashdown Audsley (1912), you'll find out whether you're a Fair Blonde, Ruddy Blonde, Pale Brunette or Florid Brunette. Which colours suit you best, and which colours are best left only to trim your bonnet sparingly? Now you'll know!

This month we publish the runner up in our essay contest.

Transitional eras fascinate me. In times of rapid social and technological change, what people wear changes dramatically as fashion collides with reality.

One such era is the early 20th Century. The years ending 1914 were named La Belle Epoque as people looked back wistfully upon the era. The graceful long gowns, the carriages, the attentive servants, all faded into autumnal memory after the Great War.