The Evelyn Family, the <i>Mundus muliebris</i> , and Conceptualizations of Fashionable Female Dress in Late Seventeenth-Century England

Abstract John Evelyn (1620–1706), in Tyrannus, or, the mode in a discourse of sumptuary lawes (1661), decried the foreign fashions that threatened the English economy and symbolized Restoration extravagance. He supposedly instilled these beliefs in his daughter Mall (1665–85), with whom he co-authored the Mundus muliebris: or, the ladies dressing-room unlock’d (1690), a remarkable satire that expressed contempt at the frivolous new modes of apparel adopted by elite women. Yet, incongruously, many of these same ridiculed styles appear in the family’s accounts and correspondence. Indeed, the purchasing habits of Evelyn’s wife, Mary (1635–1709), and daughters reveal a firm commitment to maintaining a fashionable appearance. This article recovers the unexplored attitudes of the Evelyn women towards clothing consumption and the varied ways they maintained their wardrobes. A close reading of the Mundus muliebris alongside the family’s accounts, bills, and correspondence reveals the seminal, paradoxical role of dress as highly contentious yet socially ubiquitous. Through its biographical framework, the article highlights how private consumption practices within elite households like that of the Evelyns challenge the prevalence of published narratives attacking elite women’s fashion. In turn, it reveals the dangers of taking these polemical texts at face value.