{"meta":{"version":"2.1","_links":{"self":{"href":"https://api.vam.ac.uk/v2/object/O1257492"},"collection_page":{"href":"https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O1257492/"}},"images":{"_primary_thumbnail":"https://framemark.vam.ac.uk/collections/2014HA0649/full/!100,100/0/default.jpg","_iiif_image":"https://framemark.vam.ac.uk/collections/2014HA0649/","_alt_iiif_image":[],"imageResolution":"low","_images_meta":[{"assetRef":"2014HA0649","copyright":"© Victoria and Albert Museum, London, courtesy of Frederick Warne & Co. Ltd.","sensitiveImage":false}]},"see_also":null},"record":{"systemNumber":"O1257492","accessionNumber":"LC 9/A/2 ","objectType":"Watercolour","titles":[{"title":"Studies for the Mayor's waistcoat","type":"generic title"}],"summaryDescription":"Beatrix Potter (1866-1943) is one of the world's best-loved children's authors and illustrators.   She wrote the majority of the twenty-three Original Peter Rabbit Books between 1901 and 1913.  The Tale of Peter  Rabbit  (Frederick Warne, 1902) is her most famous and best-loved tale.\r\n\r\n<i>The Tailor of Gloucester</i> was Beatrix's favourite of her little books and the second to be privately printed prior to publication by Frederick Warne &amp; Co. in 1903.  Many of Beatrix Potter’s stories begin ‘Once upon a time…’.  <i>The Tailor of Gloucester </i>is unusual in that the story takes place at a specific period – ‘the time of swords and periwigs’ – between about 1735 and 1785.  Beatrix went to extraordinary lengths to create an authentic setting. Passing a tailor’s shop in Chelsea one day, she deliberately tore a button off her coat and took it in to be mended so she could observe at first hand the tailor’s posture, tools and workbench. \r\n\r\nShe sought inspiration for the Mayor of Gloucester’s coat and embroidered waistcoat in 18th-century clothes owned by her local museum, the Victoria and Albert Museum (then known as the South Kensington Museum). In March 1903 she wrote to her publisher, Norman Warne: ‘I had been looking at them for a long time in an inconvenient dark corner of the Goldsmith’s Court, but had no idea they could be taken out of the case.  The clerk says I could have any article put on a table in one of the offices, which will be most convenient.’  Her sketches of the Museum's costumes are so accurate that it is possible to identify the original garments, including the mayor’s waistcoat, ‘worked with poppies and corn-flowers’.\r\n\n\n","physicalDescription":"Two sketches of a waistcoat in watercolour and pencil.  Top left: left front of the waistcoat showing details of embroidered leaves and flowers along the front edge with a diagram of the collar.  The waistcoat is folded in half. Centre: another view of the waistcoat with colour tests and sketch in pencil of a teapot on its side (spout to the right). ","artistMakerPerson":[{"name":{"text":"Beatrix Potter","id":"A18000"},"association":{"text":"made","id":"x28674"},"note":""}],"artistMakerOrganisations":[],"artistMakerPeople":[],"materials":[{"text":"pencil","id":"x30347"},{"text":"paper (fiber product)","id":"AAT14109"},{"text":"watercolour (paint)","id":"AAT15045"}],"techniques":[{"text":"watercolour painting (technique)","id":"THES250889"}],"materialsAndTechniques":"Watercolour and pencil on paper","categories":[{"text":"Drawings","id":"THES48966"},{"text":"Textiles","id":"THES48885"},{"text":"Clothing","id":"THES48975"},{"text":"Embroidery","id":"THES48960"},{"text":"Fashion","id":"THES48957"},{"text":"Books","id":"THES48986"},{"text":"Illustration","id":"THES48938"},{"text":"Watercolours","id":"THES277714"},{"text":"Woman Artist","id":"THES387590"}],"styles":[],"collectionCode":{"text":"PDP","id":"THES48595"},"images":["2014HA0649"],"imageResolution":"low","galleryLocations":[{"current":{"text":"LVLE","id":"THES49657"},"free":"","case":"SK Temp 5","shelf":"","box":""}],"partTypes":[[{"text":"watercolour (painting)","id":"AAT78925"}]],"contentWarnings":[{"apprise":"","note":""}],"placesOfOrigin":[{"place":{"text":"Victoria and Albert Museum","id":"x32782"},"association":{"text":"made","id":"x28654"},"note":"The Museum was formerly known as the South Kensington Museum."}],"productionDates":[{"date":{"text":"1902","earliest":"1902-01-01","latest":"1902-12-31"},"association":{"text":"made","id":"x28654"},"note":"Artwork for the book was finished by late 1902. Her letter to Warne was March 1903."}],"associatedObjects":[{"object":{"text":"652A-1898","id":"O90046"},"association":"Original"}],"creditLine":"Given by the Linder Collection","dimensions":[{"dimension":"Height","value":"293","unit":"mm","qualifier":"","date":{"text":"","earliest":null,"latest":null},"part":"sheet","note":""},{"dimension":"Width","value":"227","unit":"mm","qualifier":"","date":{"text":"","earliest":null,"latest":null},"part":"sheet","note":""}],"dimensionsNote":"","marksAndInscriptions":[{"content":"'2 Bolton Gardens'","inscriber":{"name":{"text":"","id":""},"association":{"text":"","id":""}},"date":{"text":"","earliest":null,"latest":null},"description":"","interpretation":"","language":"","medium":"","method":"","position":"","script":"","translation":"","transliteration":"","type":"","note":"Pencil inscription top left by Beatrix Potter."},{"content":"'5 bunches'","inscriber":{"name":{"text":"","id":""},"association":{"text":"","id":""}},"date":{"text":"","earliest":null,"latest":null},"description":"","interpretation":"","language":"","medium":"","method":"","position":"","script":"","translation":"","transliteration":"","type":"","note":"Pencil note in centre by Beatrix Potter."}],"objectHistory":"Given by Leslie Linder (1904-1973) to the National Book League (now the Book Trust) in 1970 as part of a representative selection of Beatrix Potter's work. This selection, comprising 279 drawings and 38 early editions and now known as the Linder Collection, was formerly on long-term loan to the Victoria and Albert Museum between 1989 and 2019 form the charitable trust, The Linder Trust. ","historicalContext":"","briefDescription":"Sketches of an eighteenth-century waistcoat (652A-1898) in the Victoria and Albert Museum; sketched by Beatrix Potter in 1902 while preparing the illustrations of the Mayor's waistcoat for The Tailor of Gloucester (1902); Linder Collection object no. LC.9.A.2; catalogue no. 4.27. ","bibliographicReferences":[{"reference":{"text":"'Anne Stevenson Hobbs (compiler), The Linder Collection of the works and drawings of Beatrix Potter : catalogue of works on paper, London, 1999'","id":"AUTH315653"},"details":"Brief catalogue entry, 4.27","free":""}],"production":"","productionType":{"text":"Unique","id":"THES48864"},"contentDescription":"","contentPlaces":[],"associatedPlaces":[],"contentPerson":[],"associatedPerson":[],"contentOrganisations":[],"associatedOrganisations":[],"contentPeople":[],"associatedPeople":[],"contentEvents":[],"associatedEvents":[],"contentOthers":[{"text":"waistcoats","id":"AAT216053"}],"contentConcepts":[],"contentLiteraryRefs":["The Tailor of Gloucester",""],"galleryLabels":[],"partNumbers":["LC.9/A/2"],"accessionNumberNum":"9","accessionNumberPrefix":"LC","accessionYear":null,"otherNumbers":[{"type":{"text":"Previous Loan Number","id":"THES50326"},"number":"LOAN:LINDER TRUST.58-1994"},{"type":{"text":"Linder Collection catalogue no.","id":"THES53323"},"number":"4.27"}],"copyNumber":"","aspects":["WHOLE"],"assets":[],"recordModificationDate":"2026-02-09","recordCreationDate":"2012-11-21","availableToBook":false}}