'At the outset Daniel Roche makes it known that he seeks to retrieve the history of clothes from the highly specialist world of folk museums and historians of costume. This stimulating work is the proof of his success.' Alan Forrest, The Times Literary Supplement

• List of plates; List of tables; Part I. History of Clothing: 1. Clothing or costume? 2. The Quicherat effect and after; 3. History, fashion and clothing systems from the seventeenth to the nineteenth centuries; Part II. The Economy of Wardrobes: 4. Towards an understanding of the Parisian clothing system; 5. The hierarchy of appearances in Paris from Louis XIV to Louis XVI; 6. The contents of wardrobes from the classical age to the Revolution; 7. The invention of linen; 8. The triumph of appearances: nobilities and clothes; 9. The discipline of appearances: the prestige of uniform; Part III. Producing, Selling and Stealing: the Distribution of Appearances: 10. From crafts to customers: the Parisian clothing economy; 11. From crafts to customers: tailors, dressmakers, linen-drapers and fashion merchants; 12. From theft to resale: another aspect of the clothes trade; 13. Caring for clothes: from propriety to cleanliness; Part IV. Truth and the Mask: 14. Clothes in the novel; 15. Rational and healthy clothes; 16. Fashions in reason and reasons for fashion: the birth of the fashion press in France; Conclusion: The culture of appearances: consumption and morality; Index.