When she lost her dear Prince Albert to typhoid in 1861, Queen Victoria set a new trend. Her lengthy mourning began a style of oppressive rituals that funeral directors were to carry on until she died forty years later. The whole court was commanded to dress in mourning clothes and Victoria herself dressed in full mourning attire for three years. Grieving on its own wasn’t enough. Inner feelings were to be on full display throughout the full-on mourning that had now become popular. Following their Queen’s lead, those who could afford to do so indulged in expensive funerals, built complex monuments on the grave and adhered to the new etiquette of mourning. To go with specific clothing came a whole set of laws restricting the way people could act. Popular household manuals provided detailed instructions about the correct etiquette to adopt for the different stages of mourning. Queen Victoria’s poorer subjects had to make do with stirring their clothing in a deep vat of black dye.

Children were comparatively exempt from the traditions and were usually not required to wear mourning attire, although sometimes girls wore white dresses. Many of their mothers, however, were almost constantly in black, because of the many deaths that Victorian families suffered. The mourning time for males was shorter. Unrestricted by the curtailed social requirements, it was allowable for them to go back to work and carry on with their daily lives. They simply wore black attire, or even just dark suits along with black gloves, cravats and hatbands.

For females, however, mourning was a serious business. Although they were able to attend church services, during full mourning they were not to be viewed in places linked with fun or enjoyment. The longest period of grieving, which would last many years, was after a spouse had died. The expected periods then went down a scale, depending on the relationship with the deceased. In the case of first cousins, for instance, the period of grieving was only for a month.

Full mourning went for at least one year and a day. During this time females were expected to dress in black crepe or in dull dresses with no sheen, trimmed with crepe. Bombazine was an often used material, being cheaper compared to non-reflective silk. Petticoats were made with black ribbon onto their hems, in case they were glimpsed. The women also carried lace handkerchiefs with black borders, special caps, bonnets with veils, even large “weeper” cuffs on dresses designed for mourners to wipe their nose during times of particular grief.

Second mourning went for nine months. Although women’s clothes would still need to be dark – generally grey – the crepe could be removed and the mourning veil could be lifted. A little jewelery was allowed, but the limit of this was hard black jet. It was a custom for locks of the deceased’s hair to be incorporated into brooches, lockets and watch fobs.

At the time of the half mourning phase, which lasted from three up to six months, there was a gradual introduction of color, with clothes moving on to lighter greys, mauve and some white. Jewelery wasn’t any longer restricted to jet and any kind was allowed to be worn.

Whatever level of grieving they were at, individuals were required in order to acquire the particular necessary clothes, or the raw materials to create them with, along with all other trimmings, the jewelery and headwear etc. Not surprisingly, a whole industry was created to cater for this fashionable new trend. Jay’s of Regent Street opened in 1841 as a kind of one-stop shop, providing everything the mourning family could possibly require. Death was a lucrative business, as holding mourning attire and crepe in the house after the mourning had ceased was considered to be bad luck. When Queen Victoria passed away in 1901, the grieving fashion she had introduced began to disappear and the funeral director’s rituals around grief changed drastically once more.

I work for a UK based Funeral Directors. I enjoy my work, we cater for all cultures and understand and respect the cultural variations with regards to funerals. It’s a nice place to be. I get to spend a lot of time online, checking out places like this!