Costume Throughout the Ages

1950

Storage GT510 EX12 1950

Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott Company

Sir John Lawrence, himself the most fashionable portrait painter in Europe and the pictorial chronicler of the Regency period, painted this portrait of John Julius Angerstein (1732-1823) and his wife in 1792. Angerstein, a businessman attached to Lloyds of London, was perhaps too conservative to be a Macaroni, whose members (men and women) were known for their high fashion, including abbreviated waistcoats, cutaway coats, tall powdered wigs with crosswise curls, and occasionally a tricorne hat perched atop (see wall display). Shoes were often covered by ostentatious buckles. Angerstein rejects the wig, but retains the fashionable hose and breeches. In the original painting his jacket is red, matching his wife’s belt.