Recently, a caller of mine who considers himself very feminine and who has spent mega money on woman’s clothing but had no clue about the history of woman’s ware stunned me. She had no knowledge of what a fainting couch was or a true understanding of corsets. She had wide feet and didn’t understand why her feet hurt in her heels yet had never heard of feet binding.
She was of the assumption that women’s attire was suppose to be comfortable just because of the material it was made with, but this is a misconception. In fact for most of history woman's ware was designed for Moral implications stemming from religious institutions chastising and confining women which has dominated women’s fashions for centuries. As far back as 1558 religious movement by the Puritans influenced dress codes and equated dress to chastity and morality.
Throughout history clothing was structured by social status and cultural influences. Dress for women has always been more confining and concealing than men’s ware. In my opinion, any man wanting to be feminized should know that Men were largely responsible for women’s fashions and that in European countries and early America ~ Fashion over Comfort ruled clothing styles up until the 1920’s when the Flapper era took over freeing women to some degree of restrictions.
However, during the 1930’s conservative clothing would return and Man would still dominate women’s dress long after women’s rights movements and feminist were burning bras.
This is not to say there has not been many influential women along the way who have been responsible in trend setting, Coco Chanel for instance, who’s designs were inspired by men’s ware and once stated “Luxury must be comfortable, otherwise it is not luxury” words which ring true today with most Women!
Even in the 21st century fashion vs. comfort is still a hot topic amongst women. Today women have been working on designing high heels that are said to be more comfortable and in designing clothing that is loose yet sexy, simple yet stylish. There are more women today in the Fashion industry than ever before in history! Sadly, places preoccupied and ruled by cultural traditions, religious beliefs and male dominated societies still dictate how women should dress.
So my thoughts are if you truly want to engage yourself into a women's world and in order to embrace feminism to the fullest then you will need to do some research. So that is the assignment this week. Do your research and then please post a comment as to something interesting that you learned. Then perhaps I can put together a time line with what information you gathered for a fun lesson in The History of Women's Ware.
Did you know?
That before we knew them as petticoats they were known as Farthingale. The Farthingale first appeared during the early 1500’s and that they were usually constructed out of wood and wicker. In Spain they were originally worn for discretionary purposes usually to hide unwanted pregnancy or pregnancy due to infidelity.
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