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論文

Experiencing Japanese Kimono: Costumes of the Japanese-Themed
Performances in the West End Theatres 1885-1905
Arisa Yamaguchi
Introduction
This paper explores the kimonos that were used as costumes in Britishmade Japanese performances in the West End theatre district of London,
from 1885 to 1905, with a particular focus on The Mikado (1885 and 1895),
The Geisha (1896) and The White Chrysanthemum (1905). An analysis of thecostumes used in these performances reveals the different transformations
evoked by kimonos. The kimono on stage was not just presented as an object
to be collected or looked at, it also functioned as an experience that could
transform western bodies and minds, and that changed depending on the
degree to which kimonos had been adopted in contemporary British fashion.
Japanese-themed performances are often discussed within studies ofJaponisme in British theatres. Gilbert and Sullivan ’ s The Mikado (1885) was
one of the earliest Japanese-themed performances to receive great acclaim
when it first opened at the Savoy Theatre in London. Ryota Kanayama
regards The Mikado as a ‘ virtual reality ’ that was not even a ‘ parody ’ of Japan
but was completely made up in Britain.1 Likewise, The Mikado ’ s story line
itself was Britain ’ s response to Japan and the wider world, as the production
was deeply influenced by the political stance of the British Empire. 2 Noboru
Koyama also discusses the Japanese-themed performances in 1885 in his
study of Japanese entertainment in the West and states how some Japanesepeople who came to London to take part in the Japanese Native Village
exhibition (which also opened in London in 1885), helped with the2020『ヴィクトリア朝文化研究』第号（18年）
Studies in Victorian Culture,18No.
(2020)

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production of The Mikado.3 These significant studies reveal that Japanesethemed performances from 1885 onwards played a key role in developing
Japonisme from ‘ collecting habits ’ into popular entertainments.
Josephine Lee studied The Mikado and its reception in America andshe argues that the objectification of the characters of The Mikado made
Japonisme familiar to the British and American middle-class householdby suggesting that ‘ characters resemble the docile objects of the parlorand dining room. ’ 4 Here, Lee associates The Mikado with Japonisme indecorative art and interior design. The costumes are not evaluated as‘ clothing ’ that was in an intimate relationship with Western bodies. By
contrast, fashion historians, Elizabeth Kramer and Akiko Savas, see Japanesethemed performances from the costume point of view in the catalogue
for Kimono: Kyoto to Catwalk, an exhibition held at the Victoria and AlbertMuseum in 2020. They describe how The Mikado and The Geisha ‘ brought
a vision of “ exotic ” Japan to a wider audience. ’ 5 A more detailed analysis
of each costume in Japanese-themed performances was conducted by
Yukiko Komeima and Kei Sasai in 2012. They concluded that the design,
colour and patterns of the kimonos in The Mikado and The Geisha played an
important role in portraying each character and narrating the story.6 While
Komeima and Sasai focus on the design of the costumes, the analysis of thetransformations experienced on stage is left unstudied.
This paper explores the relationship between kimonos and their wearers,
seeking to show how body and garment interact with one another. The three
performances discussed in this paper played an important role in suggesting
and reflecting how kimonos were understood among upper and upper-middle
class society. The process of transforming British bodies became easier andeasier, as the kimono became more familiar in Britain.

1. The Mikado
Kimonos as a Foreign Experience
The first Japanese-themed musical comedy performed in Britain wasExperiencing Japanese Kimono

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The Mikado. It opened in 1885, which was one of the most remarkable years
for Anglo-Japanese cultural history. The Japanese Native Village opened in
Knightsbridge, London, in January of that year and displayed Japanese tea
houses, temples and various forms of entertainment.7 Two months later, on 14
March 1885, The Mikado was first performed at the Savoy Theatre in London.
Josephine Lee writes that ‘ The Mikado served as the basis of knowledgeof what “ Japanese ” meant. ’ 8 It was not simply a fragmentary scene, but
encapsulated the whole idea of ‘ Japan ’ as seen by the British mind at thetime. What the visitors of the Japanese Native Village and the audiences of
The Mikado saw was kimonos ‘ in motion. ’ They were amongst the first ‘ live ’displays of Japonisme in Britain.
While The Mikado was set in the fictional Japanese town of Titipu, all
the Japanese characters were played by white actors and actresses. The story
begins with Nanki-Poo, son of the Mikado of Japan, fleeing to escape his
marriage to an elderly woman, Katisha, by disguising himself as a travellingmusician. Nanki-Poo meets and falls in love with Yum-Yum, who is engaged
to Ko-Ko, the Lord High Executioner of Titipu. The Mikado is concernedthat there have been no recent executions in Titipu and threatens Ko-Ko
with a beheading of his own unless he can find a substitute to be executed.
Ko-Ko finds Nanki-Poo, who is preparing to commit suicide in despair
over losing Yum-Yum, and makes a bargain with him. Nanki-Poo can marry
Yum-Yum for a month if he allows himself to be executed at the end of his
allotted time. In Act II, the Mikado and Katisha arrive in Titipu. Ko-Ko
hands them a fake death certificate and Katisha discovers that it belongs to
Nanki-Poo. The Mikado declares that he will execute all who are responsible
for the death of his son. To avoid the tragedy, Nanki-Poo persuades Ko-Ko
to marry Katisha, who initially rebuffs Ko-Ko but is soon moved by his lovesong. The Mikado is astonished to find his son is alive, but Ko-Ko ’ s absurd
explanation is deemed satisfactory. The musical concludes with everyone in
Titipu celebrating the happy ending.
The people who were associated with the construction of the Japanese

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Native Village helped with the production of The Mikado.9 According
to Richard D’Oyly Carte’s interview published in the Pal Mall Gazette in
September 1885, Gilbert asked a Japanese dancing master and two Japanese
girls to teach him ‘ all they knew ’ during the process of creating the opera.
Carte stated that they ‘ acquired the Japanese wriggle and the Japanese giggle
and other commodities of an equally fragile but desirable nature. ’ 11 A Japanesevisitor who saw The Mikado when it travelled to New York confirmed thatthe actresses in The Mikado ‘ would hardly [be] distinguishable from theladies of my [his] own country, ’ 12 the production also imported the Japanesebodily movements. The costume design was by the famous designer, WilliamCharles Pitcher (1858-1925). He was well-known as ‘ Wilhelm ’ in London.13
The actual making was done by the London-based costumier, Madame
León.14 In his interview, Carte revealed how the costumes of The Mikado were
put together, stating that he ‘ bought up in London and Paris everything thatwas worth having. ’ 15 He probably meant the second-hand clothes and textiles
imported from Japan that had been sold in curio shops in London and Paris
since the 1870s. Carte also explained that some of the costumes were too
old to be used for his production, so he ‘ cut off the elaborate embroideries
and had them put on brand-new grounds by appliqué work. ’ 16 Fukai and
Sasai write that the materials from a London-based department store called
Liberty ’ s were used for the costumes of The Mikado,17 and pieces of secondhand Japanese kimonos were probably appliquéd on Liberty ’ s fabrics tocomplete each costume. Although there are not many sources to study the
costumes of the first production in 1885, the photographs of the first revivalof The Mikado played at the Savoy Theatre in November 1895, give a morecomprehensive view of these patchworks. A weekly high society journal,
The Sketch, featured this revival for two weeks in a row on 8 and 15 January
1896, in which quite a number of photographs of the actors and actresses
were reproduced. It is unknown if they also used the costumes from thefirst production. The costumes in the photographs seem to be a mishmashof varied materials. For example, the three little maids ’ costumes look very

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close to real Japanese kimonos but they are mismatched, implying theircostumes were separately chosen from the random things acquired in Parisand London. 18(Figure 1) Also, the costume of an elderly lady, Katisha, has
a distinctively hybrid style. (Figure 2) Unlike the other female characters ’kimonos, Katisha ’ s kimono is greatly altered from the original kimono
form, having two-layers of garments with the top-kimono opened in front
to show the skirt-like underkimono. This open-front style probably camefrom the tea-gown trend that had been fashionable in Britain since the late
1870s, and this will be discussed at length in the following section. It waspossibly made up from two different materials, because the outer kimono hascompletely different embroidery from the inner kimono. The costumes ofthe male characters, too, clearly show the appliquéd parts on their costumes.

Figure 1: The Sketch (15 January, 1896): 615.

Figure 2: The Sketch (8 January, 1896): 565.

The kimono worn by Ko-Ko, for example, has rounded motifs placed onto
the hem of his brocaded kimono. The same brocaded fabric was also used
for the costume of Poo-Bah. Therefore, The Mikado demonstrates the hybrid

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nature of Japonisme with the western actors and actresses acting and dancing
in ‘ Japanese-way ’ while they were all dressed up in the costumes which werepatchworked in an appropriative manner. When the second-hand kimonosand textiles were brought from Japan to Britain from the 1860s onwards, they
had been used and collected as decorative objects, as if they were completely
separated from the human body. In The Mikado, on the other hand, thoseempty kimonos from Japan were cut into pieces and put together to bebrought back to life by the actors and the actresses who played a ‘ Japanese ’by mimicking the behaviours they had learnt from ‘ real ’ Japanese people.
Kimonos were presented as an experience in The Mikado. Combined withthe movements, kimonos that had been seen as objects could finally build
a more tactile and intimate relationship with human bodies. Nevertheless, italso needs to be pointed out that this ‘ experience ’ was a completely foreign
one for the British people. Wrapped in hybrid kimonos which were neither
fully Japanese nor British, they moved and posed in a ‘ Japanese ’ way as they
were instructed. Here, kimonos on stage were not objects to be collected
or looked at, but were a foreign experience. A British body was thoroughly
transformed into a foreign one by being encased in an entirely alien costume.

2. The Geisha
Fashionable Kimonos
In April 1896, only a few months after the first revival of The Mikado,
another British-made Japanese-themed musical comedy, The Geisha: A Story ofa Tea House, opened at Daly ’ s Theatre in London. It was produced by George
Edwardes (1855-1915), and the production ran for 760 performances.
The Geisha is set in Japan and concerns Lieutenant Reginald ‘ Reggie ’Fairfax of the British Royal Navy. Reggie spends his time at the Tea Houseof Ten Thousand Joys, where he meets many beautiful geishas, including
O Mimosa San, the chief geisha of the tea house. Molly Seamore, who isengaged to Reggie, hears that her fiancé is infatuated with O Mimosa San
and decides to follow him to Japan to win him back. Disguising herself asExperiencing Japanese Kimono

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a new geisha, named Roli Poli, Molly is inadvertently put up for sale alongwith other geishas after a local overlord closes the tea house in a jealous rage.
The overlord, called Marquis Imari, tries but fails to buy O Mimosa San for
himself at the sale, but instead purchases Molly disguised as Roli Poli. On thewedding day of Marquis Imari and Molly, O Mimosa San covertly switches aveiled Molly with a veiled French girl, called Juliette, who is secretly in lovewith Marquis Imari. The performance concludes with Juliette and Marquis
Imari, O Mimosa San and her lover Katana and, lastly, Molly and Reggie all
getting married and having a happy ending.
The female costumes in The Geisha were slightly less ‘ costumey ’ and rather
more fashion-focused compared to the ones in The Mikado. O Mimosa
San was played by Marie Tempest (1864-1942), who was one of the mostsuccessful singers and actresses of her era. One of her costumes was describedin an issue of The Sketch on 29 April 1896, as:[her costume is] a Japanese dress of softest grey, lined with vividly beautiful
blue, and all embroidered with pink and blue and white flowers, with whitebutterflies hovering over them, and long-legged birds with scarlet and whiteplumage poised gravely here and there. 19

O Mimosa San ’ s kimono for the final scene was also described in detailas ‘ the black ground almost covered with an embroidery of green and red
flowers wrought with gold and silver, while a lining of vivid red gives added
effect. ’ 20 No descriptions have been found explaining how and where thesekimonos were made, except for The Illustrated London News which reported
that all of the kimonos were ‘ made in Japan. ’ 21 The photographs of Tempest
in these grey and black kimonos are reproduced in an issue from 20 May
1896. In one of them, Tempest as O Mimosa San is photographed riding abicycle in one of her portraits. (Figure 3) There seems to be no attempt tomimic and replicate Japanese geisha in this photograph. Instead, it shows
Tempest in her most attractive and entertaining manner. Another kimono

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was also described in an article published in August 1896 as being made outof a pair of curtains in shimmering yellow with embroidered apple blossoms
in pale-pink and white.22 According to the article, they were looking forkimonos in yellow (Tempest ’ s favourite colour), only to find that it was
unobtainable in Japan. But the problem was solved by the ‘ transformationof the curtains. ’ 23 It seems that Tempest, who was called ‘ a barbarian in
her love of bright colours, ’ was quite particular about what she wore. The
example of her yellow kimono implies that the stage costumes of highly
successful actresses like Tempest could involve her opinions and preferences.
The colour of one of her kimonos was personally selected from her own
sense of fashion.

Figure3:TheSketch (20 May, 1896): 139.

Figure4: The Sketch (13 May, 1896): 99.

Letty Lind (1861-1923), who played Molly Seamore, first came on stage ina yachting dress by ‘ Maison Jay, ’ 24 which was one of the most fashionablefashion houses in Regent Street, London. The kimono she wore, when Molly
disguises herself as a geisha, was described in The Sketch as ‘ a white satin robe
exquisitely embroidered with pink-petalled flowers, tender-green leaves, andExperiencing Japanese Kimono

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stately silver-plumaged birds, her
dancing revealing a lining of pale
blue and a transparent under-dress ofwhite gauze. ’ 25 Figure 4 most likely
depicts the kimono described above.
The photograph portrays the scene
in which she dances as Roli Poli.
On the same page, there is anotherphotograph of her in the samekimono but without her ‘ Japanesy ’wig, which reminded the reader that
Roli Poli was her alter ego, but not
her true self. (Figure 5)
Figure 5: The Sketch (13 May, 1896):99.

In the photographs of Tempest and
Lind in their kimonos reproducedin The Sketch, their poses do not intend to look authentically ‘ Japanese, ’ but
to be an attractive parody of Japan. In addition, the way women ’ s journals
explained and described the costumes of The Geisha was different to the way
they described the costumes of The Mikado, both in 1885 and 1895, especiallywith regard to how kimonos were incorporated within the contemporary
fashions of the time. Because there were many ‘ western ’ characters who
were dressed in fashionable dresses, as well as Japanese geishas in beautiful
kimonos in The Geisha, kimonos were also included in the Victorian‘ fashionable ’ category rather than being disregarded as ‘ foreign, ’ in fact, The
Illustrated London News reported that ‘ [t]he fashionable tea-gown of the future
will surely be a Japanese Kimono with a lovely obi. ’ 26

Kimono Tea-Gown
The tea-gown trend had already been swirling in the Victorian fashion
scene by 1896. According to Sasai, tea-gowns were first seen around thelate 1870s, as a less-formal gown that was worn at the five o ’ clock tea

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with families and friends. The new habit of welcoming guests at home fortea enjoyed by the people in upper and upper-middle classes helped thedevelopment of tea-gowns in contemporary fashion. The layered style with
open-front gown was one of the typical styles of tea-gowns. It was originallydesigned as a more comfortable garment in the 1870s, but they became more
and more elaborate and fitted. According to Ashelford, tea-gowns becamevery elaborate and ‘ could be worn as an informal dinner dress ’ by the end of
the 1880s.27 One of the most expensive and famous fashion designers of theVictorian period, Charles Frederick Worth (1825-1895) even designed highly
luxurious tea-gowns.
It was also loved by aesthetes and a lot of Aesthetic-inspired tea-gowns
were available from the 1880s.28 Interestingly, Japanese-inspired tea-gowns
were seen in some high society journals as early as 1878,29 but the ‘ Japanese ’elements were often too modest to actually be spotted. Those Japaneseinspired tea-gowns from the late 1870s to the entire 1880s have a complete
western dress form with tight bodice and bustle.30 In 1892, the term ‘ Kimino, ’possibly meaning ‘ Kimono, ’ was used to describe a particular design of teagown.31 The design looks slightly closer to a Japanese kimono in the sensethat it is a one-piece with a straighter silhouette. Before 1896, kimonoshaped gowns or second-hand Japanese kimonos that had less-constructedsilhouette were only enjoyed among the artistic groups, and rarely worn daily
in most of the upper and upper-middle class households. It was later in theyear of the opening of The Geisha at Daly ’ s when a kimono-shaped gown was
introduced as a tea-gown. In 1896, the Liberty Christmas gift catalogue solda kimono-shaped gown for the first time with an illustration that they calleda ‘ Japanese Kimono (or Native Dress). ’ This kimono was described as being‘ [a]dmirably adapted for Tea Gowns and Fancy Costumes. ’ 33 While no directconnection between Liberty ’ s kimono and The Geisha has been found so
far, it may not only be a coincidence that a garment shaped like a Japanesekimono started to be sold as tea-gowns from 1896. Indeed, the costumes
worn by the actresses in The Geisha were connected to consumer culture atExperiencing Japanese Kimono

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the end of the Victorian period, and this is implied in the women ’ s journals
that introduced and featured the costumes in great detail. Furthermore, thefin de siècle catalysed the rise of musical comedies that could attract, and wereaccessible to, a broad audience.34 The most noteworthy group amongst thisaudience were upper to middle class single women, ‘ for whom the stigma ofattending the theatre had been removed. ’ 35 The performance itself, therefore,
played the role of a fashion magazine, enchanting the female audience withthe fashionable and wearable garments presented on stage. The fashionablecostumes in The Geisha were interwoven with the tea-gown trend in Britain.
The kimonos in The Geisha were not displayed as an alien and foreign‘ costume ’ but more as personal garments that would feel more familiar to a
British audience.

On-Stage Kimono Experience
In the story of The Geisha, kimono was personally experienced by an
English character through the process of ‘ disguising. ’ Since there were no‘ English ’ characters who dressed in a kimono in The Mikado, Molly wasprobably the first character who wore a kimono as an English person onstage. The sale of the indentured geishas during the last scene of Act I was a
key event which brings up the discussion of what this ‘ disguise ’ signifies inthe story. Molly Seamore dressed herself in a kimono and transformed into
a new geisha, Roli Poli, in order to ‘ win Reggie back. ’ At the sale, there is abinary opposition between who ‘ buys ’ and who ‘ is bought. ’ In the last sceneof Act I, Lady Constance Wynne, an English aristocrat who travels to Japanin her yacht, buys O Mimosa San to save her from Marquis Imari at the sale.
She holds the power to ‘ buy ’ geishas in the story. Lady Constance ’ s characteris most likely inspired by British female travellers. Anna Brassey (1839-1887),
the wife of British Liberal Party politician Thomas Brassey, who travelled theworld with her husband in their yacht. They visited Japan in 1877. Isabella
Bird (1831-1904), one of the most famous British female travellers, also
visited Japan in 1878. Lady Constance is characterised as an extraordinary

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woman with financial and social power. Molly Seamore, on the other hand,is being sold to Marquis Imari because she is dressed as a geisha. She, as wellas other Japanese geishas, are characterised as women who are destined to beowned by someone more powerful than them. The common view of Japanesewomen in Victorian Britain was that they were child-like, sensual and ‘ inneed of Western guidance. ’ 36 The word ‘ geisha ’ had entered the English
vocabulary in the 1870s, but it was this particular musical comedy that‘ did the most to cement the image of the geisha in the West. ’ 37 As Downerexplains, a song from the musical (also titled The Geisha) had lyrics that were‘ distinctly saucy, ’ leading to ‘ the image of the geisha as a creature of deliciously
dubious morals was established in the western mind. ’ 38 In The Geisha, the imageof a Japanese geisha was suggested by adding the ‘ saucy ’ and immoral
characteristics evident in the musical to the perception of Japanese women as
child-like, sensual and in need of guidance.
In Act II, her alter ego, Roli Poli, is able to return to being ‘ Molly
Seamore ’ with the help of O Mimosa San. As she escapes from Marquis
Imari, Molly exclaims ‘ you [Marquis Imari] thought I ’ d marry a JapaneseMarquis, when I can get an English sailor? ’ seeming as though she hasa choice in the matter. Molly, who earlier found herself in a position
where she was being sold, now speaks assuredly of her fate as she returns
to being an English woman. In 1896, there was a great deal of discourse
regarding a woman ’ s social identity in Britain. The feminist ideal of the‘ New Woman ’ emerged in the late 1890s, with the media being dominatedby both discussion and criticism of the movement. Independence was thefundamental idea behind these ‘ New Women, ’ who demanded political,
physical and sartorial changes that acknowledged their equality to men. The
New Woman was the kind of woman who supported women ’ s suffrage, hada job, behaved independently, played sports and rode a bicycle.39 This wascontrary to the Victorian feminine ideal that saw a woman as the ‘Angel inthe House. ’ As such, New Women were ridiculed by some for not meeting
this ideal and admired by others for their convictions. Although there isExperiencing Japanese Kimono

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no discernible sign of Molly ’ s affiliation to the movement, her coming toJapan by herself is certainly not the kind of behaviour one would expect ofa Victorian ‘Angel in the House. ’ The newly-established image of a modern
English woman, which was influenced by the rise of New Women in lateVictorian society, helped to characterise Molly ’s role in The Geisha. Molly ’ s‘ modern ’ and therefore ‘ active ’ character is exemplified even further after
she is revealed to not be a Japanese geisha. While Molly Seamore embodies
the western image of a Japanese geisha when she is wearing a kimono, hercharacterisation as a modern young English woman is emphasised when she
reveals her true identity. In The Geisha, Molly ’ s fate is thus changed throughthe influence of a single Japanese kimono. In other words, kimono in The
Geisha offers a personal experience to one English woman, that could alter
her attitude and identity. Her social identity on stage is switched between amodern English woman and a passive Japanese woman through putting on
and taking off a kimono.

3. The White Chrysanthemum
Westernised Kimonos on StageIn 1905, another Japanese-themed musical comedy opened at the Criterion
Theatre. It was called The White Chrysanthemum and was written by Leedham
Bantock (1870-1928) and Arthur Anderson (1873-1942). This fun and lyrical
production opened on 31 August 1905 and ran for 179 performances until
10 February 1906. It is a love story about an English woman named Sybil
Cunningham, who comes to Japan to follow her sweetheart, Lieutenant
Reginald Armitage of the British Royal Navy. Reginald, called ‘ Reggie ’ forshort, proposes to Sybil before leaving for Japan. Reggie initially goes toJapan for a ‘ promotion ’ so that his strong-willed father, an Admiral, might
permit him to marry his beloved Sybil. Sybil follows Reggie and arrives inJapan chaperoned by Betty Kenyon, a young widow, and the two are given
living quarters while Reggie awaits his promotion. While in Japan, Sybil puts
on a kimono and pretends to be a ‘ Japanesy ’ 40 girl known as ‘ O San, ’ or

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‘ The White Chrysanthemum. ’ She does
this so that Reggie and herself can avoid
getting into trouble with Reggie ’s father.
They are supported in their ruse by Reggie ’ sfriend and fellow officer, Lieutenant
Chippendale Belmont, while

Reggie ’s

father finds another woman, Miss Cornelia
Vanderdecken, a wealthy American heiress,
for Reggie to marry. There are some ups
and downs in the story but by the end, it
concludes with three happy couples; Reggie
and Sybil, Cornelia and Chippendale and,lastly, Betty and Reggie ’ s father.
The biggest difference between The
White Chrysanthemum and other JapaneseFigure 6: The Play Pictorial (1905): 140.

themed performances is, quite obviously,
the lack of male ‘ Japanese ’ characters, withthe exception of some rickshaw pullers. The male main characters are all
English except for a Chinese servant called Sin Chong. Most of the men,
including Reggie, are in naval uniforms that are clearly in contrast to thoseof the female characters, who wear flowing gowns with lots of frills, ribbons
and colourful embroideries. Masculinities and femininities through costumedesign are strongly defined and exaggerated, with Japanese kimonos beingemphasised as particularly feminine costumes.
Fashion is highly important in The White Chrysanthemum. The westernstyle dresses and the kimono-like gowns worn by Isabel Jay (1879-1927)
who played Sybil/O San, and the six chorus girls who played Japanese girls,
could all fit into the contemporary vogue in Britain. A kimono worn by
Jay is one of the highlight pieces of this production. The cut of her kimono
was moderated to meet contemporary western fashion with a low shoulder
silhouette, a fluted skirt and train. (Figure 6) Jay loosely wraps her kimono soExperiencing Japanese Kimono

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Figure 7: The Play Pictorial (1905): 152.

that her décolletage and round-shaped
pendant are shown. As her kimono
has a skirt-like silhouette, (similar to
Katisha ’ s kimono in The Mikado ’ s
f irst revival), what she wears
underneath is revealed as she moves.
Likewise, the six ‘ Japanese ’ girls in
the musical wear kimonos in thesame manner and their matchingunderskirts, with embroideries, areFigure 8: The Play Pictorial (1905): 142.

on view as they dance. (Figure 7)
In one of the photographs featuredin The Play Pictorial, Sybil even puts her kimono over her fashionable whitedress. (Figure 8) In The White Chrysanthemum, Japanese kimonos were notconsidered as a garment that completed a look on its own, but as a gown tobe flung on. Indeed, kimonos were rarely worn on their own when they wereused as indoor gowns in Britain at around this period. Akiko Savas confirms

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that indoor kimono gowns began to be
sold at department stores from 1900.41 An
article in The Illustrated London News fromabout ten years before suggesting thatthe kimonos in The Geisha would be thefashionable tea-gown of the future became
reality in the early twentieth century.42 Theterm ‘ kimono, ’ ‘ kimino ’ or ‘ kimona ’ waswidely used to describe Japanese kimonos,
kimono-shaped gowns and kimono-inspired
western dresses in Britain. Amongst them,kimono-shaped gowns were often used as
Figure 9: Pall Mall Gazette(16 November, 1907): 10.

indoor gowns by upper to middle classwomen in the early twentieth century.
When kimonos were worn at home, they

were almost always worn over western dresses, as seen in an illustration in a
fashion column from the Pall Mall Gazette on 16 November 1907. (Figure 9)
During the 1900s, kimonos thus became recognised in Britain as a gown tobe worn over a dress. Not only were the kimonos in The White Chrysanthemum
identical in design to those sold in British stores as indoor gowns, but thosekimonos were also worn in the way they would have been worn in British
homes in 1905.

‘ Open ’ to ‘ Conceal ’In an article from The Illustrated Sporting and Dramatic News, a critic wrote
bitterly about the plot of The White Chrysanthemum. While the anonymous
writer remarked that ‘ [t]he play is beautifully mounted and delightfully
dressed, and its costumes of east and west are in pleasing contrast, ’ 43 theyexpressed their disappointment at the story.44 While the writer pointed out
some of the parts they did not like, Sybil ’ s morality, above all, was the mostcontentious issue in the article. Sybil is chaperoned by a widow, Betty,

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and stays with Reggie in Japan until his father allows him to marry her.
The writer criticised Sybil for being in ‘ a position which is not conducive
to sympathy ’ 45 because she ‘ apparently dwells in the same house ’ 46 with
Reggie. The writer continued their argument by stating that ‘ the whole thingis most disagreeable for the heroine, who ought to have been married rightoff, or sent to a hotel. ’ 47 While some brave women were able to transcendsocial norms during the early twentieth century, Edwardian society inherited
most of its strict morality from the former period. According to the criticism
quoted above, Sybil ’ s behaviour, such as dwelling in Reggie ’ s house in Japanand disguising herself as a Japanese woman in order to deceive others, was far
from that of a respectable woman. In the musical, however, Sybil could getaway without suffering the devastating social consequences.
In the early twentieth century, there were numerous characteristics that had
been ascribed to Japanese women in the West. Childishness and passivenessdemonstrated by the Japanese women at the tea houses of the Japanese
Native Village, the three little maids of The Mikado and the indentured geisha
girls from The Geisha were the most commonly known portrayals of Japanesewomen.48 After the success of The Geisha at Daly ’ s in 1896, ‘ geisha ’ became
the term to describe a typical Japanese woman. The term not only inherited
the original image of Japanese women as childlike and passive, but they werealso seen as a ‘ creature of deliciously dubious morals, ’ as quoted earlier. In
The White Chrysanthemum, this fixed image of Japanese women inherited fromThe Geisha was projected onto the characters in kimonos. The six Japanese
girls in the musical, for example, embody the typical idea of cute, dainty andslightly frivolous geisha girls. Figure 6 is titled ‘A Little Bit of Fun While theAdmiral ’ s Away, ’ in which the six Japanese girls are carried off in the armsof British sailors. These girls were there to adorn the stage, but they also
cemented ‘ the indelible image of the geisha in her kimono as a child-likecreature, with little to offer than her body. ’ 49
In The White Chrysanthemum, the kimono plays an important role intransforming Sybil from an English lady to a Japanese woman, and vice-

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versa. Upon arriving in Japan, Sybil transforms into O San by flinging ona kimono, which makes it possible for her to put herself in a situation thatwould normally be considered immoral if she had remained dressed as an
English woman. Sybil uses a Japanese kimono to hide herself from her fiancé ’ sfather. She takes her kimono off when she is alone with her chaperon and herlover, Reggie. Kimonos in The White Chrysanthemum are all ‘ opened ’ revealing
what is worn inside and constantly alluding to the motion of undressing thegown. Kimonos were presented as an open integument, which fully covered
the British bodies but could easily be slipped off. Indeed, the image ofchildish, powerless and saucy Japanese geisha imposed on Japanese kimonos,
could hide Sybil from the social norms she should have been facing, but it
could also be slipped off more easily and freely. In the story of The White
Chrysanthemum, the kimono is used as a cloak of invisibility.
In the final scene, Sybil dresses in a beautiful dress made of white chiffon.
Her fashionable dress reminds the audience that Sybil is a respectable English
woman who is worthy of marrying Reggie. This is in great contrast to
Puccini ’ s Madame Butterfly, performed in London in July of the same year
(1905), in which a Japanese woman who marries an American naval officer
is betrayed and decides to kill herself in despair. In Sybil ’ s case, the kimono
could be cast off as she pleased, which reminds the audience that her body
is not trapped in a Japanese kimono but is rather imprisoned in her white
chiffon dress. British social norms and morality were upon her at all times,
and kimonos only temporarily hid her from them.

Conclusion
The kimonos in The Mikado, The Geisha and The White Chrysanthemum
were experienced by the performers on stage. Costumes on stage were notjust objects to be looked at from the distance, but were in a more intimate
relationship with the human body. The Mikado made a breakthrough in
Britain for kimonos to be experienced rather than being collected as objects.
Kimonos were seen ‘ live ’ with duplicated behaviours of Japanese people.

Experiencing Japanese Kimono

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The costumes were made from bits and pieces of both Japanese and British
materials. By being combined with British materials, kimono became closer
to ‘ clothing ’ rather than ‘ object to be collected. ’ By being combined withcertain attitudes and behaviours, the kimono turned into an extraordinary
experience that offered a ‘ virtual reality ’ that did not actually exist anywherein the world. The bodies that were fully costumed in alien clothes were allcompletely transformed into foreign ones.
In The Geisha, on the other hand, kimonos were not entirely separated
from contemporary fashion. They were also more familiar to the audience
because the tea-gown trends that often quoted Japanese designs were alreadyacknowledged among fashion-conscious people. Not only were the kimonosof O Mimosa San and Molly selected because they were fashionable, they
were also greeted with great enthusiasm by the female audience. Kimonos in
The Geisha were very different from those of The Mikado in the way that they
were not a ‘ foreign ’ experience but were to do with the audiences ’ everyday
lives. Indeed, a kimono is very personally experienced by an English woman,
Molly, in the story, when she discovers that how she is perceived by society
is changed by simply wrapping herself in a kimono. The British idea ofJapanese women is naturally imposed upon Molly while disguised, which she
is unable to escape from without help.
Transformation through a kimono was done more easily and freely thanever before in The White Chrysanthemum, performed in 1905. Sybil also
disguised herself as a Japanese by flinging on a kimono as Molly had done in
The Geisha, but in Sybil ’ s case, her transformation was done on stage several
times. Furthermore, Sybil ’ s kimono was, most of the time, open at the front,
so that it played a role in temporarily hiding her, instead of imposing the
British idea of Japan upon her. In The White Chrysanthemum, the image of aJapanese woman as it existed in British society was also attached to a kimono,
but the openness of Sybil ’ s kimono implied that it was always in the processof being taken off.
Kimonos as stage costumes altered their existence from a foreign

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experience that transformed a whole stage, to a more personal experience thattransformed the attitudes and identities of the individual, all of which was
also deeply associated with the process of adopting kimonos in contemporary
fashion. Western-style kimonos have evolved into a predominantly ‘ open ’gown, always implying the ‘ undressing ’ process, which enabled easy andinstant transformation.
Notes* This paper was presented at the Victorian Studies Society of Japan ’ s 18th
Conference (Japan Women ’ s University, 18 November 2018) and was later
added and modified by the author. I am grateful to the audience for theircomments.
Ryota Kanayama, 『サヴォイ・オペラへの招待－サムライ・ゲイシャを生んだもの－』[Invitation to the Savoy Theatre: What created Samurai and Geisha](Niigata: Niigata Nippo Jigyosha, 2010): p.48.
2 Ibid., pp.44-45.
Noboru Koyama, 『ロンドン日本人村を作った男―謎の興行師タナカ̶・ブ3
ヒクロさん 1839-94』[The Man who Produced the Japan Village: a Showman of
Mystery, Tannaker Buhicrosan 1839-94] (Tokyo: Fujiwara Shoten, 2015): p.291.
4 Josephine Lee, The Japan of Pure Invention: Gilbert and Sullivan ’ s The Mikado(Minnesota: University of Minnesota Press, 2010): p.19.
5 Elizabeth Kramer and Akiko Savas, ‘ The Kimono Craze: from Exoticism to
Fashionability, ’ Anna Jackson, ed., Kimono: Kyoto to Catwalk (London: V&A
Publishing, 2020): p.181.
6 Yukiko Komeima and Kei Sasai,「19 世紀後半のイギリス演劇にみる日本の服飾」[ ‘ Japanese Costumes in British Musical Comedies in the Late 19th
Century ’ ],『日本女子大学大学院紀要』[The Japan Women ’ s University
Memoirs] 18 (2012): pp.161-170.
7 Koyama, op cit., p.218.
8 Lee, op cit., p.viii.
9 Koyama, op cit., p.291.
10 Anon, ‘ An Interview with Mr. D ’ Oyly Carte, ’ Pall Mall Gazette, 7 September
1885: p.12.
1

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63

Ibid., p.12.
S. Takeda, ‘ A Japanese Criticism of the The Mikado, ’ Chicago Daily Tribune,
29 November 1885: p. 27.
13 ‘ Wilhelm, ’ Victoria and Albert Museum [n.d].
14 A journal from the Bailiwick of Guernsey, The Star, reports The Mikado ’ s firstarrival at Guernsey on 17 September 1885. An article wrotethat the costumes were ‘ made up under the artistic eye of Madame León ’from the designs provided by Wilhelm. Madame León ’ s name is also listed
as a costumery of several Gilbert and Sullivan ’ s operas. See J. P. Wearing,
The London Stage 1890-1899: A Calendar of Productions, Performers, and Personnel,
The Second Edition (Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield, 2014): p.186, 273, 337
and 415.
15 Anon, ‘ An Interview with Mr. D ’ Oyly Carte, ’ p.12.
16 Ibid., p.12.
17 Akiko Fukai,『ジャポニスム・イン・ファッション－海を渡ったキモノ』[Japonisme in Fashion: Kimonos in Overseas] (Tokyo: Heibonsha, 1994): p.174.
Kei Sasai,『ヴィクトリアン・ダンディ―オスカー・ワイルドの服飾観と「新しい女」』[Victorian Dandy: Oscar Wilde and the ‘ New Woman ’ ] (Tokyo:
Keisou Shobou, 2015): p.234.
18 Their obis, especially, are distinctively different. While Peep-Bo ’ s obi looks
thin and stiff, the obis of Yum-Yum and Pitti-Sing look as though they weremade from kimono fabric.
19 Anon, ‘ Dress at the Play, ’ The Sketch, 29 April 1896: p.42.
20 Ibid., p.42.
21 Clement Scott, ‘ The Play Houses, ’ The Illustrated London News, 2 May 1896:
p.572.
22 Florence, ‘ Celebrities ’ Clothes, ’ The Sketch, 12 August 1896: p.126.
23 Ibid., p.126.
24 Anon, ‘ Dress at the Play, ’ p.42.
25 Ibid., p.42.
26 Scott, op cit., p.572.
27 Jane Ashelford, The Art of Dress: Clothes through History 1500-1914 (London:
National Trust Books, 1996): p. 242.
28 Liberty were selling tea-gowns since 1881, which were sold at between
four and six guineas. See Sasai, op cit., p. 212. Ashelford, op cit., p.242.
29 Sasai, op cit., p.235.
30 Ibid., p.235-238.
11
12

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31
32

33
34

35
36
37
38
39
40
41

42
43

44
45
46
47
48

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Ibid., p.239.
Prior to 1896, American fashion journal, The Delineator, which also soldcopies in Britain, introduced a paper pattern for a kimono-like gown in 1890
and Liberty introduced ‘ Japanese Printed Cotton Crepe Gowns ’ without
an illustration in their catalogue published in 1892. However, in 1896 when
Liberty introduced a kimono-shaped gown named ‘ Kimono ’ as a tea-gownwith an illustration in their catalogue for the very first time. See Tamami
Suoh, 「1880-1910 年 代 の イ ギ リ ス に お け る 日 本 製 室 内 着 ―リ バ テ ィ 商
会の通信販売カタログを手がかりとして」[ ‘ Japanese-Made Gowns in
British Liberty ’ s Catalogues 1880s-1910s ’ ]『ドレススタディ』[Dress Study]
51.Spring (2007)
Anon, “ Liberty ” Yule-Tide Gifts, 1896: p.15.
Christopher Breward, ‘ Popular Dressing: 1890-1914, ’ Christopher Breward,
Edwina Ehrman and Caroline Evans, eds., The London Look: Fashion from Street
to Catwalk (London: Yale University Press, 2004): p.70.
Ibid., p.70.
Elizabeth Kramer. ‘‘ Not So Japan-Easy ’ : The British Reception of Japanese
Dress in the Late Nineteenth Century, ’ Textile History 44.1 (2013): p.20.
Lesley Downer, ‘ Geisha: Perpetuating the Kimono Mystique, ’ Anna Jackson,ed., Kimono: Kyoto to Catwalk (London: V&A Publishing, 2020): p.223.
Ibid., p.224.
Sasai, op cit., p.144.
Fred Dangerfield. ‘ The Story of the White Chrysanthemum, ’ The Play
Pictorial 39.4 (1905): p.139.
Akiko Savas. ‘ Dilute to Taste: Kimonos for the British Market at the
Beginning of the Twentieth Century, ’ International Journal of Fashion Studies
4.2 (2017): p.164.
Scott, op cit., p.572.
Anon, ‘ Our Captious Critic – ‘ The White Chrysanthemum, ’ at theCriterion Theatre, ’ The Illustrated Sporting and Dramatic News, 16 September
1905: p.81.
Ibid., p.81.
Ibid., p.81.
Ibid., p.81.
Ibid., p.81.
Shintaryo Tawata explains that the scene of ‘ women ’ welcoming ‘ men ’suggested in The Geisha and the tea house at the Japanese Native Village wereExperiencing Japanese Kimono

49

65

the perfect examples of how-society-should-be to the Victorian audience,
which can also link to the expectation of the British travellers as imperialists.
See Shintaryo Tawata.「19 世紀西洋演劇におけるジャポニズム―「日本」の表象の変遷―」[ ‘ Japonisme in the Western Theatres of the NineteenthCentury ’ ] (Ph.D. Thesis, Gakushuin University, 2016): p.241.
Downer, op cit., p.224.
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Funding
This work was supported by JSPA KAKENHI Grant Number JP19J11844.
―Graduate School, University of Tsukuba