Everyday garments, in most instances, are not garments you would wear working in the garden or slopping the hogs; these are garments that you would wear going about your household duties. They are not a best dress such that you would wear to church or on a special occasion but are acceptable for receiving guests, making calls and running errands.

Daily wear, like everything else, depends primarily on your impression, and the event scenario. If your impression is lower class your everyday dress will probably be your work dress regardless of the war year you are interpreting. Up to the middle of the war, a plain dress of cotton, wool, or silk worn with hoops is appropriate for middle class, while a fashionable wool or silk dress would be appropriate for a wealthier impression. As you move through the war years, your dress may become more worn, perhaps patched and stained. However, few in Texas were truly reduced to wearing ragged dresses or homespun out of necessity until late in the war.

For late war scenarios in Texas, everyday wear will change. As fabric became scarce and expensive and clothing wore out, homespun was then utilized, old dresses were made over, secondhand clothes became more common within the middle class and better dresses moved down the hierarchy to become everyday wear and work dresses, except for the extremely wealthy.

Wrapper

Wrappers were worn prior to getting dressed for the day. They were worn with the proper undergarments. One might wear a wrapper at the breakfast table or if receiving guests while ill or who are intimate friends. Generally a wrapper would not be worn on the street.

Sacque

Simple saques without trim and made of coarser fabrics were often worn while working at home. Worn with the proper undergarments, trimmed and of finer fabrics, they were sometimes worn at the seaside or watering places.