A fashion plate is an illustration (a plate) demonstrating the highlights of fashionable styles of clothing. Fashion plates are not depictions of specific people, but are instead generalized portraits, meant only to dictate the style of clothes that a tailor, dressmaker, or store could make or sell, or to show how different materials could be made up into clothes.
Used figuratively, as is most often the case, the term is a reference to a person whose dress conforms to the latest fashions.
Read more about Fashion Plate: History of Fashion Plates, Costume Plate
Famous quotes containing the words fashion and/or plate:
“The soul of me is very selfish. I have gone my way after a fashion that made me the center of the plan. And you who are so individual, who are so independent a spirit, whose soul is also a kingdom, have been so loyal, so forgiving, so self-sacrificing in your willingness to live my life. Nothing but love cold have accomplished so wonderful a thing.”
—Woodrow Wilson (1856–1924)
“Say “Yessum” to the ladies, an’ “Yessur” to the men,
And when they’s company, don’t pass yer plate for pie again;
But, thinkin’ of the things yer’d like to see upon that tree,
Jes ‘fore Christmas be as good as yer kin be!”
—Eugene Field (1850–1895)