English

Noun

staymaker ‎(plural staymakers)

1. Someone who makes stays.
   • 1779, The critical review, or annals of literature, volume 48, page 80:

     The author of these Memoirs informs us, that Miss Reay was the daughter of a staymaker near Leicester-Fields; and at the age of fourteen was placed as an apprentice to Mrs. Silver, a mantua-maker, in George's Court, Clerkenwell […]

   • 1837 Thomas Carlyle, The French Revolution: A History

     Her Paine: rebellious Staymaker; unkempt; who feels that he, a single Needleman, did by his 'Common Sense' Pamphlet, free America....

   • 1847, “A soirée in a porter's lodge”, in Chambers's Journal, volume 8, page 90:

     The young man bowed, and very politely led the way to a little back parlour, where the staymaker took a seat, and in a very slow and stately manner gave him numberless recommendations concerning the size, colour, and shape of her chaussure.

   • 2009, Lynn Sorge-English, “Constructing Identity: The Staymaker Forms the Lady in Eighteenth-Century Britain”, in Historical Perspectives on Social Identities, page 79:

     This entry from the diary of Richard Viney, Staymaker, is one of many in which he mentions the physicality of staymaking in the same breath with sociability with his clients.

Related terms

• staymaking