The military influence on feminine fashion predates the conflict of 1914-1918 by a long shot and the evidence of this is undeniable. These 1918 fashion illustrations show the influence that the war was having on American designers during the final year of W.W. I.
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The Paris Victory Parade celebrating the end of the 1914 - 1918 war was a long awaited and much anticipated fashion event and Mme. Parisienne was not going to miss it for all the crepe de Chin in China. This VOGUE correspondent contrasted the Paris that existed a short time earlier, the gray, deserted Paris with the Paris of the 1919 Victory Parade and notes how eager the natives were to recreate that mirthful, light-hearted Paris of 1913 that they all remembered so well. There is a great sense of joie de vivre throughout the article, but it very rapidly becomes a laundry list concerning who-wore-what-where.
One year prior to her retirement, Madame Paquin (1869 - 1936) was asked by the U.S Army to help with a particular element of uniform design. Six fashionable illustrations from Harper's Bazaar of the Fall hats for 1918:
"Paris is exceedingly critical in regard to hats even in wartime, and the new ones are most interesting. Black velvet of course is rampant, and Marie Louise especially is using much much black panne velvet..." This wartime fashion review makes one passing reference to the millinery efforts of Coco Channel.
- from Amazon:
The Paris fashion world that thrived during the August of 1914 was rightfully intrigued by the chic creations conjured up by the House of Worth, Drécoll, and Mme Paquin. Assorted dry observations regarding what the women of Gotham were sporting that last American Spring of peace (Congress would declare war on Germany during the April of 1917). | 
