Gloves: An Intimate History [Hardcover]

A captivating history of gloves both real and mythical, practical and high fashion.
 
This beautifully illustrated history of gloves draws on examples from across the world to explore their cultural significance. From hand-knitted mittens to exquisitely embroidered confections, and from the three-fingered gloves of medieval shepherds to Bluetooth-enabled examples that function like a mobile phone, gloves’ extraordinary variety is a tribute to human ingenuity. So, too, is the remarkable diversity of their—often contradictory—cultural associations. They have been linked to honor, identity, and status, but also to decadence and deceit. In this book, Anne Green discusses gloves both as material objects with their own fascinating history and as fictional creations in folktales, literature, films, etiquette manuals, paintings, and advertisements. Looking to the runway, Green even explores their recent resurgence as objects of high fashion.Gloves have become the latest hue and cry of the style hounds.
Gloves are the next big thing.
Always wear gloves!
 
Declarations such as these from fashion journalists and glove manufacturers suggest that something exciting is happening to hand-coverings. ‘The days of traditional utilitarian gloves in black and brown to keep out the cold are long gone,’ says a representative of the Millau luxury glove company Causse. ‘Ouphilosophy is to create gloves that are worn like jewels.’ Gloves in brilliant colors and dazzling designs are indeed increasingly in evidence, and practicality is hardly the point of the flamboyant versions regularly shown on the catwalk or in the pages of glossy magazines. There is justification for the excited headline ‘The Glove Makes a ComeblS(