892 margaret f. rosenthal
clearly formed gender differences and helped to shape and influence per-
sonal, aesthetic choices with new cuts and with combinations of colors,
fabrics, and ornamentation. on account of a strong entrepreneurial spirit,
tailors expanded their trade and responded energetically to competition
from northern europe by encouraging the production of locally made
fabrics that were less expensive than those imported from other coun-
tries. Cheaper silks were adorned by specialist craftsmen whom tailors
subcontracted to apply a wide range of haberdashery and ornaments onto
a diverse range of fabrics.12
Despite the increased fluidity in clothing practices, the upper echelons
of Venetian society made greater use of intricate textile weaves and inno-
vative patterns than the lower social ranks. the Venetian nobility sought
social differentiation through fashionable dress and elaborate spending
because status, they came to realize, depended not only on luxurious
cloth but also on how cloth was transformed into new styles of dress that
also followed personalized guidelines.13
Fashion also prefigures social changes in manners and basic assump-
tions about Venetian society that were widely shared by large sections
of the Venetian population. Clothing, for example, increasingly helped
individuals of all social stations resolve debt issues.14 Formed as separate
and discrete parts that circulated and recirculated after the death of a
person, clothing was altered and realtered for individual family members
and for individuals in larger networks that extended beyond the family.15
as an elaborate assemblage of sleeves, bodice, doublet, partlet, shirt, cape,
undergown, and head covering, clothing could be sold in portions if the
occasion arose. these detachable parts moved from person to person and
served also as gifts, donations, and bequests.
since fashion as a system extols the new and depends less on conserva-
tism and tradition, clothing in early modern Venice no longer served the
same purpose it had in the past for storing value, given the proliferation of
cheaper lighter-weight textiles that imitated more expensive weaves, and
12 Belfanti, “the Civilization of Fashion,” p. 273; orsi landini, “Da vanità a virtù,” p. 74;
Currie, “Fashion networks,” pp. 498–500; and Catherine richardson, clothing culture,
1350–1650 (aldershot, 2004), pp. 15–17.
13 Carole Collier Frick, Dressing Renaissance Florence: Families, Fortunes, and Fine cloth-
ing (Baltimore, 2002), pp. 5–6, 31, 72–74.
14 horodowitz, “the new Venice,” p. 4; allerston, “Consuming Problems,” pp. 11–46.
15 on the desire for the new in relation to clothing, see eugenia Paulicelli, Moda e
Moderno: Dal Medioevo al Rinascimento (rome, 2006), pp. 7–8; and Jones and stallybrass,
Renaissance clothing, pp. 1–5.