A guide to researching Australian and international fashion, designs, designers, industries, textiles and fabrics, patterns, tailoring, dressmaking, uniforms, accessories, and body art.
Phyllis Tortora’s The Fairchild encyclopedia of accessories or Oliver Gerval’s Fashion accessories provide excellent overviews. In his preface to Oliver Gerval’s book, Alber Elbaz noted the influence of fashion accessories:
How a belt can accentuate the waist by refining or lowering it, how the body can be lengthened or shortened, or how a shoe alters the small of the back or the curve of a leg, all of which have an effect on the proportions of the garment.
Phyllis Tortora’s book deals not only with fashion accessories, but also with components, such as the History and significance of fur to fashion accessories or the History and significance of gems, gem cuts, and settings to fashion. Both works are useful starting to points for wider exploration in the Library’s collections.
When searching the catalogue try some of these searches. From the results list use the options at the left of the screen to further refine your search results.
 |
| Denton hats, H2007.115/9 |
For general articles about fashion accessories go to choose the Articles option from the dropdown menu next to the search box on our catalogue and enter keywords.
Full text articles can be accessed within the Library by anyone, and outside the Library by Victorian registered Library users.
From the results list use the options at the left of the screen to further refine your search results.
The Library has several extensive fashion databases. These can be accessed within the Library by anyone, and outside the Library by Victorian registered Library users.
Browse the epitome of international style in the US version of Vogue from 1892 to the present. In colour and including the full content of every page.
Explore world dress and fashion throughout history, including ebooks, articles and thousands of images for clothing and costumes.
Please note: BFL is part of the Bloomsbury Fashion Central platform. The State Library does not subscribe to all of the content on the platform.
Spotlight Discover more about this resource in our Online Collection Spotlight: Berg Fashion Library blog post.
