The fact that fashions change is one of the surest rules of nature. Coming in a close second to THAT rule is the rule that we will laugh at the fashions which have passed. (And I think third place is that we all deny that we will ever laugh about what we’re wearing NOW. This says something about us, but why fight it as long as it gives us something to blog about.)
Today we are not going to consider such issues as the changing lengths of hems (as at the top of this column) and what years a handlebar mustache was the mark of a fashionable man. I thought we might look at some fashions of the past which make people today heave a sigh of relief at having missed THAT style. For example the slit skirt seen here could, with modification, has made numerous comebacks, and that absurd little handbag never really went OUR of style among some people. But the fashion which required an entire bird wing fixed to each side of a hat (and yes, they did use real bird wings) went south a long time ago and would cause too many shudders ever to migrate back into style. (I hope. That any prediction of future fashion will prove wrong is ANOTHER major rule of life.)
We have already blogged about the high starched detachable collar, a fashion so cursed by the wearers even when it was expected in daily life that its demise was mourned by no one (except possibly the makers of collar buttons.)
Yes, the foundation garment has never quite left us. But at least the fashions which decreed that every woman (and many men) simply HAD to wear one have slipped away.
And most of the figure-shaping undies of today are designed to be easier to put on, so that the corset lace beloved of no one but cartoonists and certain lingerie lovers have largely gone the way of the collar button.
We also, nowadays, would member put up with the walking stick, a feature of so many photos and drawings of men of the past that we stop seeing them after a while. Notice how fashionable this young man is, with his high collar, his spats, and his monocle. We may one day SEE detachable collars make a comeback, and even spats, while the monocle has never gone away in some circles. But that walking stick is NOT going to come back. We like our hands FREE (for holding our phone.)
I think the same thing applies to the parasol. (Look over at THIS young man, by the way. Was the pocket watch just a distant ancestor of the phones of today? I think so, but really, that’s a whole nother blog.)
The parasol does have its place in modern fashion, but like the monocle, it looks out of place as the bearer walks along a crowded street. Parasols are limited to photo shoots, or events where a person has the leisure to twirl (kind of like the handlebar mustache.)
And the hatpins you have probably noticed in this and the previous postcard are also largely gone, except as things you turn up at a flea market and say “What the heck is THIS for?” Maybe women don’t wear hats the way they once did, or maybe they don’t wear hair that would hold onto a hatpin, or maybe they’ve just found a better way to handle the whole problem. (Anyway, don’t you have to let that hat blow off anyhow if you’re planning a Meet Cute for your rom-com?)
Men as well as women wore shoes that buttoned way, way up, one of the reasons the buttonhook was invented. The only current use of a button hook is for people to find it at a flea market and mistake it for a hatpin. These buttons way down near the floor added extra complexity to getting dressed and undressed every day.
As, of course, did the long johns with the buttoned trap door at the back. These, also, can still be purchased, but most people just turn up the thermostat instead. And gone from most of modern civilization is the custom of being sewn into your flannels at the first frost and not being able to take them off again until the world thawed out months later. You may think the usual jokes about keeping your trap shut would mean this column has come to the end.
But nay, I say thee. Linger just long enough to consider that before the snap and the zipper were invented pants were secured with buttons. (Remark also on the spots for attaching your suspenders.) In fact, before the invention of elastic, underpants needed that same array of buttons. This allows me to revive an obsolete advertising slogan of the 1930s, when the first boxer shorts with a popular brand of snap closures hit the market. The man in the ad proudly announced, “I don’t need a wife! I wear shorts with Grippers!”
See what I mean about the relief at changing fashions? Until now, you’ve been able to avoid THAT.
Blogsy Babbles 