Caraco

A caraco is a style of woman's

The caraco emerged as an informal style in France in the 1760s,[1] based on working-class jackets. It was worn with a petticoat and, if open in front, a stomacher or decorative stays. The English caraco was generally closed in front. A similar garment with a wrap front, called in English a bedgown or short gown, was the standard working woman's costume of the later 18th century.^[1]

Gallery

Women's jackets and short gowns of the 18th century

• 
  The Chocolate Girl, 1743–45, wears a fitted jacket, petticoat, and apron.
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  Working woman's bedgown and petticoat, 1764.
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  Caraco jacket in printed cotton and skirt in quilted silk satin, 1770-1790,

  ModeMuseum Provincie Antwerpen

  .
• 
  Drawing of a Caraco, by David Ring.

Notes

References

• Cumming, Valerie, C. W. Cunnington and P. E. Cunnington. The Dictionary of Fashion History, Berg, 2010,
  ISBN 978-1-84788-533-3
• Takeda, Sharon Sadako, and Kaye Durland Spilker, Fashioning Fashion: European Dress in Detail, 1700 - 1915, Prestel USA (2010),
  ISBN 978-3-7913-5062-2

• Caraco and matching petticoat, Victoria and Albert Museum, c. 1770s.