In general, it’s women’s fashion that changes so dramatically from one year (or one season, even) to the next. Men’s clothing is much more difficult to pinpoint in time, for most of us, than women’s clothing.

One at-a-glance clue to nailing down the timeline on fashion is to look at the style of women’s hats, as well as the hemlines and the whole silhouette.

But the male of the species is not without the occasional mad phase of flaunting his plumage. Just think of the lace-ruffled Regency dandy, the well-fed Edwardian gent with his velvet lapels, the pin-striped mobster of the 1930s, the young slicked-back Elvis Presley, or those tight-trousered disco kings of Saturday Night fever…

100 years of East London style in 100 seconds

Quick — can you catch all the fashion trends of the century, as they dance by?

Nice touch, having the woman dance alone briefly in her Rosie-the-Riveter wartime gear, before her partner comes flying back into the scene in his spiffy, prosperous post-war civvies!

Don’t you find that the trends tend to blend together, and a look you might tend to associate with one decade turns out to be from a slightly earlier or slightly later period? Fascinating — both the costumes of the recent past, and our conceptions of them!

Pop quiz on fashion history aside, however, it’s just a whole lot of fun to watch the styles boogie (jitterbug, foxtrot, tango, bugoloo, bop, bump…) on by!

This really is quite a clever bit of advertising, well sugar-coated as a blend of entertainment and education. Advertising? Why, yes, in fact:

Directed by Jake Lunt with The Viral Factory, the film was shot over 4 days in east London locations with hundreds of costume changes. The music was commissioned from Oscar nominated genius Tristin Norwell who took a simple tune and interpreted it for each decade over 100 years.
~ 100 YEARS / STYLE / EAST LONDON: Westfield Stratford City

This video was posted on YouTube by “Europe’s largest urban shopping centre, Westfield Stratford City” in advance of its official opening on 13 September 2011.

Which explains the date given in bold red letters at the end.
And why “East London” in particular.
And why the century of fashion runs from 1911 to 2011, instead of even numbers.

Neat-o!

First, let me give you a little background on “Lucky” — the mummified cat that one Domestik Goddess reader discovered (most unexpectedly!) in the roof of an old thatched cottage in Ireland…

Note to the squeamish: You didn’t honestly think I was going to spring a grisly photo on you, did you? This tiny little thumbnail picture is here for you. If you’re all prepared to study “Lucky” in more detail, however, you can click on the small picture to see a larger version — or read on to see another thumbnail photo that gives just a tiny bit closer look).

A while back, you might recall, I wrote about the fascinating old tradition of hiding ritual objects in houses as protection against evil spirits and witchcraft. And I mentioned the old boot — a tiny child’s riding boot, well worn, and just the one — found many years ago in the chimney wall of my grandfather’s old farmhouse in New Brunswick, Canada. That tiny old boot was an object of great fascination all through my own childhood, and I longed to know the story behind it. That’s why, when I learned of this old superstition that led people to hide strange objects in their houses, I was (and remain) quite fascinated — which is why I wrote about Dried Cats and Witch Bottles in the first place.

Strange Things Found in Old Houses

It turns out that this sort of thing is much more common than one would think — at least in northern Europe and the United Kingdom, and in countries like Canada and Australia, which were largely settled by colonists from that part of the world. No doubt other cultures had their own versions of the superstition…

Boots and shoes were common choices for protective objects, in the UK tradition, it seems; and I’ve learned that other bits of clothing are sometimes found in old houses as well.

My theory:
It may have something to do with keeping close a very personal piece of gear that once belonged to a loved one who died — something about a loving spirit offering its protection to those left behind. And it makes sense to me, learning that many of these objects had clearly belonged to children, that the purity of an innocent young child would have been seen as having extra power to protect the family in the home where these objects were hidden away.

A Carpenter’s Tale

If you’ve been following DomestikGoddess.com for a while, you may be aware that we’re always bashing away at This Old Farmhouse — and this summer was no exception. Tearing off the old back porch, we found the name of the man who built the house, a century ago, written on the back of a piece of moulding. That led to talk of things found in old houses, and our carpenter, Alvin, told us to look out for money.

Questioned about this, he told us that he’s found a great many objects hidden in the walls and ceilings of old houses where he’s worked on renovations. A shoe or two, for sure. And some strange hieroglyphics, marked onto old beams with chalk or charcoal. Bottles of various sorts. And a lot of old newspapers — but that’s a different thing, I think: old newspapers were often used as a feeble attempt at insulation between clapboards and plaster.

But mostly what Alvin has found is coins — some of them quite rare and collectible, too! Almost every old house where he’s had to rip out old plaster walls has produced a coin or two, he says, tucked away on top of a cross-member or roof truss; one had been hidden on a projecting brick inside an old fireplace chimney. It pleased me, somehow, when Alvin told us that all but one of the homeowners asked him to put those coins back where they were — or at least as close as possible, given whatever changes had been made during renovations, to where they had been hidden away a century ago.

Clothing, footwear, money… all that’s well and good. But other traditional ritual objects are a bit less pleasant to contemplate. Bottles of urine, for example — “witch bottles” as they are known. And the corpses of cats. Which brings us to the subject of this photograph.

“Lucky” the Irish Dried Cat

A couple weeks ago, Jules, in England, came across Dried Cats and Witch Bottles, my little write-up about the mysterious tradition of hiding protective objects in old houses:

I have only just found out about dried cats. Foolishly I brought the one that dropped out of the roof in my old cottage in Ireland back to England. Now I really think I should take it back – what on earth will Ryanair make of it?

How wonderful is that?

Naturally, I asked whether there was a photograph… and received this picture of “Lucky” within the day!

(Imagine, if you will, the great delight it gave me to shout out to He Who Hogs The Power Tools, “Someone just emailed me a picture of a dead cat!”)

Jules said that they all “ran screaming” from the house, when the mummified cat dropped out of the thatch, then went back in (“very slowly”) to see what it was that had descended so abruptly.

In the same house they also found two shoes — a small child’s dancing shoe, up in the roof space, and another that had been boarded in at the side of the fireplace. And in another house — a timber frame cottage in Kent, England — a large shell under one of the foundation timbers, under the stairs. It must have been placed there carefully, deliberately, or else it surely would have been crushed. (I like to think that it might have been a treasured souvenir of some sea-faring son, lost at sea; the shell kept in memory of him, and hidden in the house so his spirit could keep the family safe from harm.)

Jules checked in with Sam, the brave friend who appears on the other end of the pitchfork, and they’ve both given kind permission for me to publish this rare photograph here — because you know it’s just too interesting not to share with other social-history buffs!

As for “Lucky,” he is currently residing in Jules’ barn and awaiting his return trip to Ireland — where he rightfully belongs.

Old superstitions and domestic rituals don’t easily die out, even when the meaning of the ritual becomes obscured by the passage of time. I’m starting to suspect that there may be many more of these ritual objects hidden in old houses across Europe and “the colonies” than we, steeped in the 21st Century, might realize. And when we do find these strange objects, odds are that we fail to recognize them as having a special significance in cultural history. Perhaps you’ve found something peculiar, too, in the midst of an old-house renovation?

Remembrance Day is the only thing that can make our grey bleak November weather seem exactly right. The sound of the distant pipes; the few old men who still march to the cenotaph in berets and medals; the young cadets standing with heads bowed and hands crossed on rifles at each corner of the square…

And more than anything, what really catches me in the back of the throat, every year the same, is the sudden deep booming sound of the cannons’ salute — those big guns echoing down the years and down the river valley, from village to village, each small community with its own memorial cairn, its own group of silent observers to wipe away a windstruck tear, and its own list of long-ago farmboys’ names to be read aloud on 11 November.

But like the brave red poppies of Flanders fields and Remembrance wreaths, those bright red sparks against the grey of rainclouds and gravestones, there’s something indomitably bright in the human spirit. And as long as we can see those poppies bud and bloom — in the fields of Normandy, or in fields of hope and imagination — surely, all is not lost.

Photo: amandabhslater

Lovers of art and fans of technology will equally appreciate this stunning video, tracing the evolution of our ideals of feminine beauty through famous portraits of women, spanning the centuries.

I’m sure there’s a deep message to be gained here — something about beauty and art and character showing through the eyes and body language giving clues to the authority of women in a certain place and time.

But frankly, I’m just not that much of a feminist intellectual, nor an art historian. I just think these woman are beautiful… individuals, or one ever-changing Platonic Ideal of womankind.

Enjoy.

[via The Silent Maiden]

When I was a child, my grandfather had an old farmhouse that had been built onto in sections over a period of 175 years. My aunts always believed that the back chambers of the oldest part were haunted by a long-dead young woman named Charlotte.

I don’t know the details of the ghost story, but I do know the spooky back chamber’s attic was where, years before I was born, they found — as well as the Cupid oil lamp that I’ve told you about — a variety of very peculiar objects, much older, hidden in the wall and beneath the floorboards.

(My mother still has an old leather boot that her brother found when he replaced the plaster of a closet wall, stuffed in with the mouse-droppings and old newspapers that served as insulation. We couldn’t imagine how it came to be inside the wall!)

Nothing as odd as a mummified cat carcass, however… or “witch bottles” filled with urine… or even a mysterious pagan symbol drawn in candle-smoke…

Ian Stapleton, who specializes in renovating and restoring old houses, sheds light on such strange discoveries as these. Apparently, they were intended as ritual objects placed in old houses and other buildings to protect the occupants from witches and evil spirits.

These objects have been found in the UK, Continental Europe, Australia and North America. The majority of such objects are found in buildings constructed before 1800 but they have been discovered in buildings dating from as late as the early 20th century.

Ian suggests that ritual objects are more common than one might think, but not always recognized for what they are — even by some professional people who really should know about such things.

It’s important to document your find with notes and photographs, he says, and details some of the most types of common ritual objects to look for when you’re working in an old house. After all, that’s a piece of cultural history that tells more about the lives of our (quite recent!) ancestors than any public monument ever could.