During Victorian times fashionable dress for ladies changed almost as much as it has in modern times. Fashionable dresses were comparatively expensive which made them the preserve of middle and upper classes. Etiquette demanded that the correct dress was worn to meet the varying demands of meeting callers at home ,attending dinner parties of perhaps visiting the theatre. The below diagram traces fashions for ladies from  1794 to 1887
	In 1856 Punch Magazine printed a cartoon showing a lady half in and half out of her fashionable crinoline dress