Fashion and Masculinity in Renaissance Florence - by Elizabeth Currie (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

Dress became a testing ground for masculine ideals in Renaissance Italy. With the establishment of the ducal regime in Florence in 1530, there was increasing debate about how to be a nobleman. Was fashionable clothing a sign of magnificence or a source of mockery? Was the graceful courtier virile or effeminate? How could a man dress for court without bankrupting himself? This book explores the whole story of clothing, from the tailor's workshop to spectacular court festivities, to show how the male nobility in one of Italy's main textile production centers used their appearances to project social, sexual, and professional identities.

Sixteenth-century male fashion is often associated with swagger and ostentation but this book shows that Florentine clothing reflected manhood at a much deeper level, communicating a very Italian spectrum of male virtues and vices, from honor, courage, and restraint to luxury and excess. Situating dress at the heart of identity formation, Currie traces these codes through an array of sources, including unpublished archival records, surviving garments, portraiture, poetry, and personal correspondence between the Medici and their courtiers.

Addressing important themes such as gender, politics, and consumption, Fashion and Masculinity in Renaissance Florence sheds fresh light on the sartorial culture of the Florentine court and Italy as a whole.

Review Quotes

As far as fashion studies is concerned, it is too early to tell whether this excellent book will herald a sea
change in the scholarly landscape - but one can certainly hope that it will.
Critical Studies in Men's Fashion

Important and illuminating ... Currie profitably mines the rich vein exposed by previous historians of clothing [and] makes expert use of contemporary written sources on fashion and etiquette ... [The book offers] so many riches and such careful analysis.
Times Literary Supplement

This book opens up the wardrobes of elite Florentine families, showing how subtle and sophisticated the choice of dress could be in the sixteenth century. An intelligent, beautifully illustrated and original study, this is essential reading for anyone interested in how clothing "made the man" during the Renaissance. Highly recommended.
Evelyn Welch, Vice-Principal (Arts & Sciences), King's College London, UK

About the Author

Elizabeth Currie is a lecturer and author specialising in the history of fashion and textiles. She was formerly a Research Fellow and Tutor in the History of Design at the Royal College of Art, UK and an Assistant Curator in the Furniture, Textiles and Fashion Department at the Victoria and Albert Museum, UK.