A Visual History of Costume is a series designed for those who need easy-to-use reference material of the history of dress. Each book covers one century. The central part of each book is a series of illustrations, in black and white and colour and arranged in order of date, taken from the time of the dress itself. These include oil paintings, engravings, woodcuts and line drawings. By the use of such material, the reader is given a clear idea of what was worn and how, without the distortion and loss of detail which modern line drawings can entail. Each illustration is captioned in a consistent way, under the labels of head, body and accessories. The clothes are described, explained and interpreted. The reader may need to know whether a certain style was fashionable or unfashionable at a certain time, usual or unusual. The book is aimed at the student, designer or collector. Valerie Cumming is also the author of Gloves and Exploring Costume History 1500-1900.