| Title | 1. ‘Nature Is so Much Better than Dyeing […] You Cannot Get the Same Colour’ |
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| Subtitle | Colourful Feathers, Nature and Artifice in the Age of Empires |
| Contributor | Ariane Fennetaux(author) |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.11647/obp.0501.01 |
| Landing page | http://www.openbookpublishers.com/books/10.11647/obp.0501/chapters/10.11647/obp.0501.01 |
| License | https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ |
| Copyright | Ariane Fennetaux |
| Publisher | Open Book Publishers |
| Published on | 2026-05-11 |
| Long abstract | This chapter brings together different developments which occured in conjunction in the second half of the nineteenth century: the expansion of European Empires, which fuelled an appetite for colourful exotic feathers and broadened the chromatic expectations and tastes of western consumers; the development of aniline dyes and the impact of their vibrant, fast colours on feather dyeing; and a growing environmental consciousness, leading to the condemnation of the destructive use of the colourful plumage of wild birds. Combining research into dye recipes, company archives from both sides of the Atlantic, patents taken out by feather dyers and material sources in museums, the chapter contextualises nineteenth-century feather dyeing practices within the longer history of feather dyeing and the construction of empires. In the process, it positions late nineteenth-century feather dyeing as a rich conundrum that allows us to explore the entangled histories of nature and artifice in the age of empires. |
| Print length | 26 pages |
| Language | English (Original) |
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Ariane Fennetaux is Professor of British History at Université Sorbonne Nouvelle. She is a specialist of the history of textile and sartorial practices in Britain and its empire in the long eighteenth century. She is the author, with Barbara Burman, of The Pocket: A Hidden History of Women’s Lives 1660-1900 published with Yale University Press in 2019. In 2022 she edited, with John Styles, The Holker Album. Textile Samples and Industrial Espionage in the 18th Century (Paris, Presses du musée des Arts décoratifs), a facsimile publication of John Holker’s book of textile swatches accompanied by critical essays. She currently works on the intersections of dress and fashion with environmental history, and on the global circulations of textiles, textile crafts, materials and techniques in the early modern period.