4to. (11 1/4 x 9 inches). One hand-coloured aquatint title & 24 hand-coloured costume plates, some heightened with gold or silver. (Section published for June 1799 loosely inserted, about six plates with appreciable browning). Contemporary tree calf (worn) expertly repaired. A selection from the "most splendid of English costume books, and the first real venture in this country of a periodical devoted to the changing taste in dress" (Abbey). Many of the excellent hand-coloured plates are heightened with touches gold and silver and are notable for their fine backgrounds and incidental details. "A Gallery of Fashion is a work long wanted and wished for and now makes its appearance upon a very extensive plan. It is a collection of the most fashionable and elegant Dresses in vogue. This work, so necessary to point out the superior elegance of the English taste, is the first and only ever published in this country; it surpasses anything of the kind formerly published in Paris and shews at once the different fashions invented in different periods; in short, it forms a Repository of Dress. The Publisher will make it his particular study to select those magnificent dresses, in which the Ladies appear at the routs, the opera, the play-houses, and the concert-rooms; as well as those elegant morning dresses for Hyde Park and Kensington Gardens. Several Ladies of rank and fashion have not only approved this plan, but they have at the same time granted permission to the Publisher to make drawings of their new dresses and to insert them in this Gallery; thus, the credit of the invention of the different dresses, will be secured to those Fair Subscribers who contribute to the embellishment of this work (if they have no objection to their names being mentioned). And they will find the Publisher always ready to represent their dresses in that style of elegance, and that original taste, which is so peculiar to the British Ladies. This Gallery will not only be interesting to Ladies of the highest fashion but must be deemed necessary to every person concerned with the fashions of the day. It is likewise submitted to the admirers of the fine arts, as an agreeable series of objects, for the imitation of those Ladies who wish to mix entertainment with improvement." (Advertisement, at the front of vol.I) Coloured plates in order: 1. Title page. Gallery of Fashion. Month of April 1799. 2. Morning Dress. Fig CCXIV. 3. Afternoon Dresses. Figs CCXV & CCXVI. Gallery of Fashion. Month of May 1799. 4. Morning Dresses. Figs CCXVII & CCXVIII. 5. Evening Dresses. Figs CCXIX & CCXX. Gallery of Fashion. Month of June 1799. 6. Riding Dress. Figs CCXXI / Morning Dress Fig CCXXII. 7. Afternoon Dress Fig CCXXIII. Gallery of Fashion. Month of July 1799. 8. Afternoon Dresses. Figs CCXIV & CCXV / Morning Dress Fig CCXVI. 9. Court Dress. Fig CCXXVII. Gallery of Fashion. Month of August 1799. 10. Morning Dresses. Figs CCXXVIII & CCXXIX. 11. Afternoon Dress. Fig CCXXX. Gallery of Fashion. Month of September 1799. 12. Morning Dresses. Figs CCXXXI & CCXXXII. 13. Afternoon Dress. Fig CCXXXIII. Gallery of Fashion. Month of October 1799. 14. Morning Dresses. Fig CCXXXIV & CCXXXV. 15. Evening Dress. Fig CCXXXVI. Gallery of Fashion. Month of November 1799. 16. Morning Dresses. Figs CCXXVII & CCXXVIII. 17. Evening Dress. Fig CCXXIX. Gallery of Fashion. Month of December 1799. 18. Morning Dress. Fig CCXL / Half Dress Fig CCXLI. 19. Evening Dress. Fig CCXLII. Gallery of Fashion. Month of January 1800. 20. Morning Dress. Fig CCXLIII. 21. Evening Dresses. Figs CCXLIV & CCXLV. Gallery of Fashion. Month of February 1800. 22. Morning Dress. Fig CCXLVI / Afternoon Dress. Fig CCXLVII. 23. Court Dress. Fig CCXLVIII. Gallery of Fashion. Month of March 1800. 24. Morning Dresses. Figs CCXLIX & CCL. 25. Evening Dress. Fig CCLI.