Unfortunately this was the only photo of it that I could find. I found that the gown was held at the Newport Historical Society and emailed them, and the lovely person who responded sent me additional photos of the gown.
I then went on a fabric hunting quest. I searched high and low, found some things that were similar but the wrong color, experimented with dyeing fabric, all to no avail. Then one day, browsing on eBay, I found this and nearly squealed with delight:
I think it's pretty darned close. I emailed the seller asking if he'd provide any kind of discount for large yardage purchases, and he kindly agreed, so I now have all 10 yards that he has on its way to me.
I cannot find any more images of this gown. The Newport Historical Society website has a good description of the construction, but it's definitely going to be a challenge to figure out that over skirt. The description says there is a "complicated system of tapes" holding all the poofs in place. I am planning to use the Ageless evening bodice pattern that I used for the Butterfly Gown for the bodice, it's extremely close. The under skirt is simple. The over skirt is going to require a lot of draping/practice to figure out though!
I bought a book on the House of Worth on Amazon - supposedly it has a ton of photos of gowns including construction details, so I am hoping that will give me some insight for draping the over skirt.
