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Fashion philosophizer and designer Elizabeth Hawes (1903 – 1971) recognized the sham that is fashion – in the attached photo-essay she writes plainly on the matter.
The book is available at Amazon.com:
Fashion is Spinach
In his review of contemporary Broadway costume design for the Autumn of 1933, the fashion journalist asked the pressing question:
What is the well-dressed play wearing these days?
There was much talk of Chanel, Schiaparelli and the House of (Elizabeth) Hawes as he heaped the praises high and deep for the the rag-pickers who clothed the ungrateful actresses for such productions as Men in White, Undesirable Lady, Her Master’s Voice and Heat Lightning.
The fashions in the plays are vivid, authentic, and wearable. They have sprung from the gifted brains and fingers of the cream of the crop of designers, Schiaparelli and Chanel in Paris, and our own industrious Americans who, themselves, are becoming hardy annuals. The silhouette is lengthening into slim height but even in sports clothes corners are rounded and curves are accentuated…
Published in a 1930 fan magazine, this article tells the story of the earliest days of cosmetic surgery in Hollywood:
Telling the actual names of all the stars who have been to the plastic surgeon is an impossible task. They won’t admit it, except in a few isolated instances…It is only lately that a few of them are beginning, not only to to admit that they’ve had their faces bettered, but to even go so far as to publicly announce it.
Click here to read more articles from PHOTOPLAY MAGAZINE.
Click here to read about feminine conversations overheard in the best New York nightclubs of 1937.
Looking back, the fashion silhouette of the 1950s is remembered as having a very narrow waistline, but in the early days of the decade, as this 1951 fashion review indicates, the feminine waist was a highly contested battle ground:
Where’s the waist? Paris popped the question, but has yet to give the answer. On the one hand, many leading designers showed a tendency to raise the waistline. But they were challenged by a strong minority that seemed determined to drop it [pictures of both high and low are provided herein]…Apparently, Paris has decreed it the year of the wandering waist. Where it will stop may well be up to American women.
If you’d like to read about the feminine silhouette of the early Forties, click here.
Fashions these days are simply fraught with Third World influences such as tattoos and piercings and there is no reason to suspect that fashion’s dictators might one day soon decide that the elegant life is best lived with a cone-shaped head. The attached fashion article is illustrated with three pictures of the mode-conscious Manbetu tribe of Northeaster Africa who live life large as the African Longheads.
The thought that one’s appearance should never be a burden for others is not entirely a Victorian concept, it was more than likely borrowed from the Greeks:
It is every woman’s duty to make herself as beautiful as possible;and no less the duty of every man to make himself pleasing in appearance. The duty of looking well is one we owe not only to ourselves, but to others as well.
Click here to read about physical perfection during the Golden Age of Hollywood.
By the time 1947 was coming to a close, an enormous shift in the fashion winds had taken place that altered the silhouette of the fashionable woman. Waists were narrow, hips were padded – and the hemline had dropped as much as twelve inches. The New Look out of Paris dictated the appearances of suits and evening wear, but blouses were left out of the revolution – everyone had to figure it out for themselves and hope that the couturiers from across the sea would come to the rescue the following season.
A look at the suits and fashion trends for the Summer of 1919.
This illustrated fashion review shows four images that depicted the sophisticated offerings by Jacques Fath and Elsa Schiaparelli from their respective 1951 mid-summer collections. What the American women who gazed upon these pages learned is that the era of the padded hips was continuing its march into the next decade.
Thumbnail descriptions of what numerous European fashion designers were offering during the Spring of 1953.
*Click here to read about the 1956 college fashion craze*
The attached piece was written in the shadows of W.W. II – a time when Levi Strauss’ famous blue jean fabric was not simply being woven for the 12,000,000 souls in the U.S. military, but also the civilian war-workers who donned jean overalls and found them ideal for the heavy, industrial labor that they faced each day.
As if this wasn’t enough to keep the factories of Levi Strauss & Co. humming happily, the American teenagers also discovered blue jeans in the around the same time and have been devoted to them ever since. The author of this article could never have known that the social revolution that made the name Levi a household word all across the globe was only nine years away.
The miracle that was Volcanized Rubber allowed the well-dressed man to maintain his dashing profile even when called to compete in athletics. Two of the oldest surviving examples of a sport shoe that uses this particular style of rubber and has been in continuous production since the twenties and thirties are both made by Converse: one is the Jack Purcell tennis shoe and the other is the black canvas, high-top Chuck Taylor Basketball shoe.
This 1922 men’s fashion article is illustrated with seven images and riddled with wise words for all those seeking information regarding 1920s backless vests, patent leather dancing shoes, madras dress shirts and kid suede gloves for semi-dress wear.
Attached is a printable fashion editorial from a 1939 issue of CLICK MAGAZINE which beautifully illustrated (in color) one of the chic, California beach fashions of the day.
A glance at the 1921 wardrobe enjoyed by those fashionable fellows who were part and parcel of that Wall Street clique who might today be called the one percent.
The reviewer also devoted some column space to classic fox hunting attire and Chesterfield overcoats,hunting tweeds,wing collars and men’s suit from the early Twenties.
Here are a few short paragraphs accompanied by nine images concerning what the college girls of the early Fifties were wearing:
A girl can still get into college with a sweater and skirt, but for full credit she needs quantities of gadgets. For campus, girls stick to classic Brooks Brothers sweaters, pleated skirts, blue jeans – but go wild on accessories and underwear novelties…
The journalist then went to some effort listing many of the fashionable essentials: stamp bracelets, rhinestone handcuff bracelets, silk pleated turtleneck sweaters and harness-neck bib fronts – all to die for.
