Drea Leed has studied historic dress for over two decades, with a primary focus on the costume and material textile culture of the fourteenth through seventeenth centuries.
Over the years she examined and written about extant garments of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, and has presented papers on several costume and textile-related topics at the Medieval Congresses in Michigan and Leeds. She has worked as a consultant on costume history for Christie's, as well as being invited to give seminars and workshops on various aspects of historic costume research and construction for various historical and academic groups.
Her publications include
Elizabethan Underpinnings, discussing the underwear, corsets and hoopskirts of the Elizabethan era, and
The Well Dress'd Peasant, a book on clothing in Flemish Genre art in the sixteenth century. She has also published articles and book reviews in
Medieval Clothing and Textiles and
Renaissance magazine.
View Curriculum Vitae (pdf format)