Fashioning Alice

Book excerpt: 150 years after Alice's Adventures in Wonderland was first published, Lewis Carroll's eponymous heroine has become one of the most familiar figures in the cultural landscape. The enduringly iconic figure of the Victorian child, Alice has inspired countless fashion designers, illustrators and stylists. The 'Alice Look' has been embraced across the world, by young and old alike, and by both the feted and the forgotten. Fashioning Alice is the first book to chart the emergence of Alice as a style icon. Kiera Vaclavik traces the evolution of Alice's visual identity in the nineteenth century and explores the myriad ways in which she was dressed – on the page, on the stage, and in the home. The book also draws on historical sources to examine amateur performance and play not just in the UK but in the USA, Japan and Australia. Illustrated throughout, Fashioning Alice is a ground-breaking exploration of Alice's visual career that offers a compelling case study of the intersections between fashion and fiction.