Abuse of empire style robe to thermal insulation and body discomfort (part 2)

Abstract

Purpose Women in Western Europe wore empire style robes which were made with a light and thin fabric revealing their body. To stress the silhouette of their body, they applied oil to it or sprayed water on the robe so that it would cling to the body, and most women suffered from muslin disease, meaning flu and tuberculosis of the lungs in winter season. The purpose of this paper is to examine the thermal insulation of the robe with spencer jacket in dry and wet environment through thermal manikin experiments. Design/methodology/approach Three kinds of spencer jacket were made based on historical evidence and data, and experimental work for thermal insulation was conducted using a thermal manikin. The study measured the total thermal resistance of dress-jacket set: weight of the clothing before and after wetting, thermal insulation of the spencer jackets and set of clothing in dry and wet conditions, electric power consumption of the set of clothing in the wet condition and temperature inside the clothing and surface temperature of the wet set of clothing. Findings The thermal insulation of the robe with spencer jacket in the wet condition was in the range of 0.135-0.144 clo, which was about 80 percent lower than the range of values of 0.73-0.79 clo measured in the dry condition. This means that women felt uncomfortable in wetting condition or raining environment even when wearing the robe with a spencer jacket. Thermal insulation of clothing was dependent to the air gap under garment, clothing layers, ventilation through fabric and body part. Originality/value In this study, the thermal insulation of an empire style robe with spencer jacket in wet condition was measured using a dry thermal manikin, not with the sweating manikin. The authors measure the electric power consumption according to drying time of the clothing set at the body parts. In order to study the effect of different materials and clothing wetting, comparison experiments were conducted in dry and wet conditions using the rinse cycle of washing machine.