1888 Bustle with Pocket
by Lena Smith
About the Patent
- NAMELena Smith
- PATENTUS382059A
- DATEMay 1, 1888
- LOCATIONPatented in the United States – inventor residing in New York, US
- INVENTION“Bustle”
- THEMEConcealing [more about our themes]
About the Inventor
We have not been able to confidently identify this Lena Smith amongst many with the same name in the census and newspaper archives. All we know about her is from the opening of the patent document: “Be it known that I, Lena Smith, a citizen of the United States, residing at the city of New York, in the county of New York, and state of New York…”
About the Invention
PROBLEM
A lack of pockets has meant that women have had to be inventive in the ways that they kept their few personal or precious belongings safe. The bustle was an ordinary, everyday and intimate part of their clothing ensemble that was often utilised for storage. But how to make it easier to use this space? This was the problem Smith set out to solve.
SOLUTION
Smith designed a bustle with side flaps that could be opened to enable the normally empty space inside it to be more conveniently put to alternative use for carrying things. Metal spring-ribs give the bustle its curved form, with rivets or similar construction techniques used to hold them in place. The ribs are covered with a suitable fabric, which extends out to the sides to form side pieces and the flaps used to access the space inside. Buttons secure the flaps and keep them closed.
Open Access Patent Document
See the complete US patent.
“This bustle is used in the same way as other devices of its kind (…) but it may also be used as a sack or pocket in which the wearer may stow away many things inconvenient to carry in the hands – such as a gum rain-mantle [rain cape] and the like.”
— Lena Smith, inventor
Bustle pockets in the press
Speculatively Sewing Lena Smith’s Invention
Learn more about speculative sewing here
We made many multi-scaled and multi-material iterations of Smith’s invention. We started with a half-sized paper version and a full-sized paper version to map out the shape (this was the first time anyone in the team had made a bustle). These toiles helped us to understand how the structure could hold its shape and provide space to conceal and carry things.
The next version was a full-sized calico toile using cable ties as boning. We tried wearing this version and felt the weight of the bustle with different items hidden inside it. The openings enabled the wearer to access the storage space from either the left of the right side: the person just needed to be flexible enough to twist around sufficiently. Securing the openings with a clip ensured that items did not fall out of the bustle. We surmised that for some wearers, this design of bustle was not about providing access and transportation options for useful items whilst out and about, but rather about constantly carrying things of value about their person.
We noted how secure the bustle felt and how that might have assured the wearer, who otherwise had little, if any private space, that her personal valuables were always safe on her body. Articles in the press confirm this.
There were many accounts of women, of all classes, using their bustles to secure precious goods or their life savings. They may have been travelling, transporting goods between sites, or living in insecure lodgings. For women, even for those in relationships and secure homes, there were still few private spaces to call one’s own. As Fennetaux (2008, 307) writes: “Although eighteenth-century women were increasingly in charge of running the house, the domestic interior afforded them very little actual privacy.”
We constructed a final piece in heavier wool – a Dashing Tweed high-vis reflective weave. This version was made for a performance at Glastonbury in 2023 called “POCKETS of POWER” and it was covered in a bright neon power mesh. See more about that performance below.
You can read our open access journal article about speculative sewing here.
— Fennetaux, Ariane. 2008. ‘Women’s Pockets and the Construction of Privacy in the Long Eighteenth Century’. Eighteenth Century Fiction, 307–44.
Smith’s invention was part of POP’s theatre show
POP team collaborated with the award-winning feminist theatre company Scary Little Girls, led by Becca Morden and Dr Naomi Paxton and featuring a troupe of talented performers, to produce an interactive and immersive theatre show based on POP research.
Called POCKETS of POWER, this theatrical collaboration involved comedy, spoken word, songs, sketches, puppetry and audience games. It showed how women throughout history radically reinvented the worlds of clothing invention and design to solve problems and smash stereotypes.
This show was commissioned and performed at Glastonbury 2023, Being Human Festival 2023 and Mayven Arts Festival in Cornwall 2023.
More Research Relating to Smith’s Invention
Below is a selection of research activities relating to Smith’s invention and pockets more generally. Click through to learn more.
The Speculative Sewing Inventory is part of the Politics Of Patents project, which has received funding from the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme. Grant No: 819458. Politics Of Patents is hosted by Goldsmiths College, University of London.
