A guide to researching Australian and international fashion, designs, designers, industries, textiles and fabrics, patterns, tailoring, dressmaking, uniforms, accessories, and body art.
For both recent and historic information on wedding attire and evening wear, search our catalogue with terms such as:
Our catalogue
To find images of formal wear, search our catalogue using the Pictures & Photographs dropdown with the following keywords:
Trove
Open the Trove database and search using terms such as weddings and evening wear.
Once you have conducted your initial search you can limit it to magazine articles, images or even newspaper advertisements.
Ballgowns by If you wish to search for full text magazine articles choose the Articles tab above the catalogue search box.
Here is an example of an article search for evening wear. Any item in the results list can be accessed within the Library by anyone, and outside the Library by Victorian registered Library users.
Wedding periodicals - find relevant magazines held by the Library.
Australian Women's Weekly - images of weddings and brides. Use the green coverage bar to select a particular time period between 1933 and 1982, and to Illustrated items. For more recent non-digitized issues, try the Library's print collections.
Life magazine - illustrated American magazine digitised from 1936 to 1972. It covers a wide range of subjects including contain images and content on fashion and design, such as brides during World War 2 and evening wear. For items on bridal wear tick the Search all issues box beneath the search box and enter relevant keywords.
The Library has eresource collections rich in fashion material. These can be accessed by any onsite Library visitors, and from home 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.
Vice-Regal Ball, Exhibition Building, Melbourne June 1st 1864 H15519
Sketches at the Mayors ball AS27/08/83/153
Wedding party H2011.20/69
Model on podium in evening gown H2002.199/406
Jenny Gordon, Swanpool debutante and partner H2005.100/2786
Sketches at the Mayor's ball A/S16/07/81/233
Bridal party H86.71/2
