1920s
Fashion
What Those Roaring Women Wore
Trends are always changing for teens
and young women so what clothes will you wear this year?
Think the twenties will return? Take a look at the 1920s
fashion streak and decide. It’s possible that no era in
fashion saw as much change in such a short period of time as
the 1920’s. The period after the end of World War I was
a time of great social change, and women’s fashion
reflected that. The stock market was booming, women were
entering the workforce in record numbers, and women had
recently earned the right to vote. This new attitude of
liberation manifested itself clearly in 1920’s
fashion.
One of the most important changes of
the decade was the abandonment of the corset. The “new
woman” of the 1920’s wanted comfortable
sportswear. 1920’s fashion was relaxed and moved well.
Above all it was designed to be wearable.
The silhouette of 1920’s fashion
was very different from the hourglass shapes of the
Edwardian Era. Indeed, during the 20’s, a very flat,
almost boyish look was in style. Dresses were long and
straight, busts were flat, and hair was often short. All
signs and signals of feminine curves were out of style in
the 1920’s.
The figure most popularly associated
with the fashion of the 20’s is, of course, the
flapper. Flapper fashion started in the middle of the
decade, around 1926. Prior to that, hemlines were still
quite long, at about mid-calf length. The flapper look was
pioneered and promoted by that indelible icon of 1920’s
fashion, Coco Chanel. Chanel designed sportswear which was
relaxed, yet sleek and modern. It perfectly suited the
boyish look of 1920’s fashion.
Around the time when the flapper look
began gaining ground, hemlines also got quite a bit shorter,
rising all the way to the knee. Bare arms and
stocking-covered legs became the norm of 1920’s
fashion.
Because women were now baring so much
of their legs, a new focus on stocking fashion began to
arise. Designers sold stockings in a vast array of bright
colors, and embroidered, patterned stockings became the
rage.
Looking back at the 1920’s,
it’s hard to imagine how the new, modern trends in
fashion must have looked to those who had grown up in the
Victorian and Edwardian Eras.
Waistlines dropped and basically
disappeared; arms were completely bared; hair was cut short.
1920’s fashion even changed the way women stood and
moved, as iconic cloche hats hid their eyes, forcing them to
tilt their heads to see! Women smoked and drank and danced
to jazz music, all in public.
Although 1920’s fashion seems
rather quaint to us today, it must have seemed positively
scandalous at the time.
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