Women’s Ready-to-Wear Multiple Retailers 1860–1914: H. J. Nicoll and Alfred Stedall

This paper offers a case study of two London firms active in the production and distribution of women’s ready-to-wear clothing before 1900, H. J. Nicoll and Alfred Stedall. The sources used are registered advertising images from the Records of the Copyright Office, Stationers’ Company at The National Archives; Companies House records (also at The National Archives); and newspaper advertisements sourced from the British Newspaper Archive. These three archives have allowed me to evaluate the uses made of advertising images, and to relate this to the companies’ development, reflecting on the gaps and omissions between the three sources. This research has uncovered a nationwide chain of women’s ready-to-wear retailers, an unexpected development that may require some rethinking of current historiography. It also throws light on the locations and practices of London-based clothing workshops, which have proven resistant to study.