Dress for a girl: drop waisted style in tobacco brown crepe; The Lilliputian Warehouse brand made by W Hayford & Sons, England, 1920-29

The dress has a scoop neck outlined in stem stitch worked in light golden brown silks, and three quarter length sleeves with faggotting worked in matching golden brown silks around the armhole and above the hem. The fullness of the garment falls in unpressed pleats between the shoulder and the dropped waistband, which is of a lighter brown shantung silk and is decorated with spiral rouleaux of tobacco brown crepe. The skirt also falls in unpressed pleats, and the half lining of thin white washing silk has a lace edging at the armholes. The garment fastens at the back of the bodice with a vertical line of alternating press studs and hooks and loops.

Given by Mrs. Caroline Woollett

Given by Mrs. Caroline Woollett (RF 90/1254). Said by the donor "The brown dress I assume to have been worn by my mother or her sister in the twenties" respectively Margaret Hine Fry (born 18/4/1913) and (Edith Josephine) Barbara Fry (born 30/9/1911)

Brand name: The Lilliputian Warehouse

W Hayford & Sons was a London-based firm known to have been in existence 1910-20, with premises in Sloane Street and Regent Street. At one point the company was in possession of a royal warranty, indicated by the phrase 'By Appointment to HM the Queen' found on some garments. Surviving examples of Hayford's children's clothes are often in unusual colours and 'artistic' appearance, and probably appealed to a customer base which would previously have been identified as 'aesthetic'.

MISC.225-1991