Regency Ball
17 May 2008

Dancing Master: Mr Reginald Battle
Music by The Pemberley Players (as featured in ITV's production of Northanger Abbey)

Reception 7.00pm
Dancing starts promptly at 7.30pm
Carriages at 11.30pm

Dress Code

The dress-code for the Ball is strictly period costume – for inspiration on what to wear for the evening, period dramas and films are an excellent source of costume ideas, particularly the 1996 production of ‘Pride and Prejudice’ with Colin Firth and Jennifer Ehle and the more recent ‘Jane Austen Season’ adaptations. For further guidance on what to wear please see below.

If you wish to hire a costume for the evening, there are various costume hire centres and local theatre companies which stock period costumes, such as West Yorkshire Playhouse in Leeds, York's Theatre Royal costume hire and Birmingham Costume Hire.

The Buffet

A Regency buffet is included in the ticket price but as we are not licensed please bring your own bottle of wine to enjoy with your food.

Dance Practice

As there may not be many of us who recall the dancing steps of such Regency favourites as the Childgrove, Parson Upton Dorothy or Mr. Beveridge's Maggot there will be a dance practice in the afternoon with the Dancing Master who will run us through the dance steps for the evening. The dance practice will be from 3pm -5pm on the afternoon of the Ball and we highly recommend that you attend, if not least to get you in the spirit for the festivities to come.

Tickets

There are just 50 tickets available for the Ball, priced at £30 per person, don’t miss out and book your place in Regency Society today by contacting us at oversealehouse@hotmail.com Please note that due to the limited number of places, tickets are strictly non-refundable.

Further Guidance on What to Wear

Ladies

During the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries women’s fashions attempted to imitate Greek and Roman statues.

The Dress: During the early Regency era evening dresses had slim, gathered ankle length skirts, medium-high waists, short sleeves and loose V-shaped, round or square necks. Trains or demi-trains were frequently found on ball dresses although be careful if you wish to attire yourself in such a manner, for as one etiquette manual descries “Long trains are, of course, too cumbrous an appendage to be intentionally assumed when proposing to dance; but it must also be marked, that very short petticoats are as inelegant as the others are inconvenient” (Mirror of Graces: London 1811). After 1810 dress waistlines rose higher; sleeves were small and puffed. Borders of ribbon, pleats and flounces ornamented dress hemlines. During the early teens many ball gowns were also made with over-dresses of net or fine lace. Dresses of white and pale pastels were popular throughout the era.

Hair: Fashionable Regency hairstyles were also modeled after Greek, Roman and even Egyptian styles with either very short hair brushed forward onto the face with curls or in long ringlets with the back hair swept up onto a high bun and the face framed by curls. As the Regency era progressed long hair became increasingly popular and full ringlets began to appear near the side of the face. Hair ornaments for balls included jewellery, bandeaux, turbans and wreaths of grapes and towards the latter end of the Regency era flowers, turbans and ostrich feathers were seen to adorn the hair.

Accessories: Long white gloves were worn ending above the elbow. Evening shoes were flat, ballet-style pumps of either black or white and made of satin, soft leather or silk, “On brilliant assembly nights or court drawing rooms, the spangled or diamond-decorated slipper has a magnificent and appropriate effect. But for the raiment of the leg we totally disapprove at all times of the much ornamented stocking” (Mirror of Graces: London 1811). Cameos, crosses and pearls and bracelets (worn over the long gloves) were considered suitable for jewellery.

Gentlemen

As was the case with women’s fashion, nineteenth-century men’s clothing was also based on European ideals; but unlike women’s dress, ballroom costume for men remained fairly static and conservative. As with women’s fashions, etiquette manuals also stressed the importance of appropriate clothing for men. However, gentlemen dressed only in morning or evening attire. Manuals were usually straightforward in their instructions “wear frock-coats in the streets, dress coats in the dining or drawing room” (True Politeness: New York 1848). Dress coats (or tailcoats) reflected the shape of women’s fashions for high waists, cutting away at the front to show the waistcoat) and were worn in dark colours such as dark blue, green, claret, brown and black. The waistcoat was of a matching or contrasting colour or pattern. A white shirt and standing collar was worn with cravat. During the first 15 years of the nineteenth century short knee breeches were gradually replaced by snug-fitting ankle-length pantaloons (trousers) and by the mid-teens these trousers had reached the top of the instep and were held in place with an under-strap. Low-heeled black shoes or pumps were traditional for evening wear: “Gentlemen are not permitted to enter the Ball Room in boots, spurs, gaiters…or with canes and sticks; nor are loose pantaloons considered proper attire for a Full Dress Ball” (Thomas Wilson: London 1816). Gentlemen were expected to wear white or light kid gloves when attending Balls and parties.

What the Etiquette Manuals Say…

“The ball dress requires a union of beauty elegance, lightness and magnificence. All the required resources of toilet must be lavished upon it…for plain ball dress, black or prunella shoes; plain silk stockings; white taffety slip; a gauze or a muslin dress, trimmed with wide ribbons in puffs, or other slight ornament, sleeves and body plain; the last slightly showing the neck; the band with bows or clasp of the same colour as the trimming, the hair uncovered and ornamented with bows of ribbon or a flower; earrings and necklace of roman pearls; white gloves and scarf of transparent material suited to the prevailing colour, which is generally rose or azure blue. As the robe is always worn a littler lower in the bosom that ordinary, the scarf or any other equivalent fichu may be assumed in the intervals of dancing.” (Mrs A Walker: New York 1840)

“The seasons of life should be arrayed like those of the year. In the spring of youth when all is lovely and gay then as the soft green, sparkling in freshness, bedecks the earth, so light and transparent robes of tender colours should adorn the limbs of the young beauty. If she be of the Hebe form, warm weather should find her veiled in fine muslin, law, gauzes and other lucid materials to suit the character of her figure and to accord with the prevailing mode and just taste together…[for the female youth of fair complexion] the colours of their garments, when not white, should be the most tender shades of green, yellow, blue or lilac…” (Mirror of Graces: London 1811)

“Grass-green, though a colour exceedingly pleasing and refreshing in itself jaundices the complexion of the pale woman to such a degree as to excite little other sensations in the beholder than compassion for the poor invalid. Such females should in general choose their robes of an intire colour; and when they wear white garments they should animate them with draperies, mantles, scarfs, ribbons etc of pale pink, blossom colour, celestial blue, lilac, dove-colour and primrose; leaving full green, deep blue and purple to the florid and amber, scarlet, orange, flame-colour and deep rose to the brunette.” (Mirror of Graces: London 1811)