Suit

This plain brown wool day suit exemplifies the fashions of middle class Frenchmen in the 1780s, at a time when Anglomania (love of English style) was noticeable in French society, even at the Court. It is the sort of clothing sometimes depicted in the inventories of manufacturers and industrialists, for example. The suit is accessorised with fine cut steel buttons, which may be of English manufacture, possibly Birmingham or Wolverhampton. Cut steel accessories were stocked by high class retailers in Paris,who imported English made-goods, such as Madame Blakey's Magazin Anglois (English shop) in rue des Prouvaires, very close to the prestigious rue St Honoré. Toyware (small metalwork goods such as buttons and buckles) were important commodities in British industrialisation in the 18th century.