Parvati Magazine December 2013 - Remembrance | Page 24
FASHION
RETROSPECTIVE
I
t’s hard to believe how fashion was so very different 100 years ago compared with today.
Back in the early 1900s, no fashionable lady could possibly dress herself without the help of
a few more hands. An era in France called “La Belle Époque” was a time in fashion where
well off women wore elaborate, upholstered, hourglass dresses that were incredibly beautiful, yet incredibly inconvenient. Paris was the world leader in fashion at that time.
The outfits were painstakingly elaborate, with corsets and ornate details. There was something called the S-Bend corset that was very tightly laced at the waist, and forced the hips
back and breasts outward, creating an S-shape. Luckily, that silhouette gradually evolved
into a more straight and upright silhouette.
In the 1910s the outfits became much more soft and fluid. The famous impressionist painters influenced designers at the time. Fabrics were being dyed to match the colours found
in famous paintings. When the First World War hit, things started shifting as women were
FASHION
forced to work, which created a demand for more
practical clothing. Tightfitting corsets and flowing gowns just did not fit
in. Attending funerals became a common social
event (a side effect of the
war) and darker, mourning appropriate colours
became the norm.
In 1915 the skirt lengths
started climbing slowly,
starting around the ankles, then above the ankle, then to mid calf. After
the end of the First World
War in the 1920s there was
a surge of energy never
felt before and skirts and
dress lengths went above
the knee. It was a radical
time in fashion known as
the Golden Age (known
as the period in between
the two world wars). Corsets were gone; women
started dressing more like
boys, and the bob hairstyle were in. This new androgynous style became
very popular. The ‘flapper’
style was in. Coco Chanel
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