Dress Historian Kate Strasdin Breaks Down Period Costuming in TV & Film

- [Narrator] Consider the household

of the Baron Featherington.

Three misses!

- Okay. Corset myth bonanza here.

(bright music)

Hi, my name's Kate Strasdin, Author and Dress Historian,

and I'm gonna talk to you today about some period dramas

and break down some of the accuracies, or inaccuracies,

in some of these clips.

(bright music)

This clip is from

"The Personal History of David Copperfield,"

and we're going to look at the scene with the donkeys.

- Hello. Can you wake up?

- (coughing) What are you doing?

- Medicine. Reviving you.

- So what I love about this particular adaptation

of "David Copperfield," and what you see here,

is real saturation of colour,

and there's no particular intention to be 100% accurate.

This isn't necessarily about accuracy,

it's about creating a kind of fantasy

of early Victorian dress.

And because it's intentional, it's really successful.

You have Tilda Swinton

in this brilliant kind of golden bronze dress.

And there are details that are really accurate,

so the kind of smocking on the sleeve

that was very much a period detail from that decade.

Then you have different details

that just kind of bend it slightly,

and make it unexpected.

But I think it works because it's intentional.

So, "David Copperfield," is representing the working class.

He's wearing a knotted scarf and this plaid shirt,

and working dress doesn't survive.

So, whereas designers often have access

to surviving garments from the middle and upper-classes,

you don't get very much.

So very often designers have to work