Unpacking an Edwardian portrait from 1902

Don’t you just love a portrait that has the date it was taken written on the verso? That’s not often the case, but luckily it is with this lovely full-length image from the collections of the State Library Victoria. Meet Alice Caire, who posed for this photograph on 18 November 1902 for her 21st birthday. And there is reason to believe the date is accurate, when we look at the visual clues in the portrait. 

 

I particularly love the fashion that we see in images from the first decade of the 1900s. The delicate lace, the beautiful structured collars, the embroidered sleeves. And I love how fashionable outfits changed throughout the decade. The shape of the skirt, the length of the sleeves, and the height of the neckline can all help us to work out the timeframe an image may have been taken during the first 10 to 12 years of the 20th century. 

In the image we see here, Alice is wearing an outfit befitting of the early 1900s and fashionably on-trend, as you would expect from a young woman celebrating her coming of age. Her clothing follows the hour-glass silhouette that was favoured in the late 1890s and early 1900s. The frilled panel on the bodice cascades towards a tailored skirt that is shaped over the waist and hips before leading down to a flounced, floor-length hemline. I feel there’s a touch of the whimsical about Alice’s outfit and even her expression – it’s almost theatrical in its composition.  

Alice’s hair is styled into artful, loose waves, which was a popular hairstyle in the early Edwardian years. Her hair is adorned by a bow on each side and she holds what looks like an artificial flower in her hand that almost matches the floral backdrop behind her. 

There are quite a number of portraits of Alice held by the State Library Victoria, which made me wonder who she was. Using Ancestry records I found her family tree online, which connected me to her birth, marriage and death records. Alice married Walter Edward Bennett in 1914 and gave birth to a daughter, Edna, in 1916. Alice lived her entire life in Victoria before passing away in 1957 at the age of 75. The portrait that we see here was gifted to the Library in 2013 as part of Edna’s estate.

I find Alice’s portrait completely captivating. There is something ultimately rewarding about being drawn into someone’s story via a photograph, which then springboards you into learning not only about the fashion of the time, but also some of the details of their life. 

Cassie Gilmartin is co-host of the Portrait Detective podcast and previously, editor and founder of Inside History magazine. She is a frequent contributor and spokesperson for Ancestry.com.au.

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