It Was Non-Stretch Fabric for Victorian Science

Day one, reporting from my 19th-century lady naturalists #sciart performance art project dressing as Mary Elizabeth Banning (above), the "mother of Maryland mycology:" non-stretch clothes are stiff.
Early women in science botanized, watercolored, and shell-collected uprightly. And I wasn't even wearing a corset. I might never.

Ye gods my starched and ironed high-necked 100% cotton white shirt had sharp edges. And my great-grandmother's jade brooch was stabby.

Nevertheless she persisted in the living history of the fashion history of science.

So many places to chafe.

My wont in a sweatshirt had been to like Little-Red-Riding-Hood-about-the-forest sling my mushroom foraging basket over my forearm, but there was no slinging, I was not in fast-fashion athleisure. I had to place it there upon my forearm like a 19th-century novel.

It wouldn't be as good of a story in yoga pants.

I looked like a Edwardian governess on the moors. I missed my yoga pants. I missed clothes with forgiving synthetic stretch whose plastic fibers end up in our drinking water.  Next time I go out hunting for mushrooms I'm going to dress more sensibly:

Photo credits:

https://www.etsy.com/listing/72400237/mary-banning-with-mushrooms-portrait
https://vintagedancer.com/victorian/victorian-blouse/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_Red_Riding_Hood
http://quatr.us/economy/gathering.htm