history of swimwear - St George Fashion Design

Unit LMTFD4014B
Element 4.1 the function of clothing is related to fashion design.
By looking at the history of swimwear we can see the relation between
historical events, inventions and moral behaviour that prompts fashion
designers to respond.
The History of the swimsuit in the 20th Century
1920’s Athletic Tank suit
Fashion history was shocked into the 20th century with some of the newer
all revealing figure hugging swimsuits that revealed the body limbs more
clearly than ever before.
Liberated from long skirts, young women of the twenties wore a figure
hugging wool jersey sleeveless tank suit.
The swimming suit was ideal for the androgynous athletic figure that
fashion suited best in the 20s. It looked very similar to male swimming
costumes of an earlier era.
The swimsuit legs stopped at an unflattering point mid thigh and beneath
the swimsuit legs were built-in modesty shorts.
Swimsuits were often in dramatic abstract patterns or stripes and those
with poorer figures covered them up with wraps.
Whilst the new bathing cap of the 1920s, ideally suited to bobbed hair
was not unlike the cloche hat of the same era.
1930's Women's Bathing Suits
Feminine cotton printed bathing suits often with little over skirts to hide the
thighs gradually replaced the ugly 20's fashion. The 20's suit, which
sometimes sported cutout sections in the midriff panel, disappeared as it
evolved into a two-piece garment. By this era most of us would recognize
the late 1930's swimsuits as one that bears some relationship to
swimwear of today.
Hollywood stars also added glamour to the swimsuit so that bathers
needed to consider having one in the latest fashion. Esther Williams and
Dorothy Lamour along with films featuring synchronized aqua swimming
whipped up interest in figure hugging costumes with higher cut legs and
which revealed every body contour.
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1940-60 Corset Like Swimsuits
In the 1940s, corset manufacturers saw a gap in the market. Corsetry
was losing ground, but the new more revealing swimsuits really needed
experts to design garments that hid faults in a woman's shape. They
achieved this by adding stretch tummy control panels to hold in the
stomach. Manufacturers also used bra cups and boning to give bust
support. Costume could then be worn either strapless or with small straps
that buttoned onto the inside.
Women still continued to wear all in one swimsuits in the 1950s. They
also took great care to cover up their hairstyles with a swimming cap or
bathing cap, usually holding their head well out of the water when
swimming. The swimming caps shown left were decorated with plastic
petals or leaves to make them appear prettier than a bald fitting bathing
cap. A wide range of fabrics including lined cotton, stretch Lastex and
elastic ruched waffle nylon was popular for a while. Zips were still used
in the centre back of swimsuits retaining the corset like appearance until
the early 1960s.
The swimsuits of the 50s and early 60s were cut straight across the top of
the leg in the form of a modesty apron that hid the separate matching
fabric crutch. Subtle changes occurred in a few years and the modesty
apron style soon looked old fashioned.
1960's Lycra Women's Swimwear
By the mid 1960s, fabrics were mainly nylon or Lycra or a mix of the two
materials. The all-important factor was stretch and pull on like a pair of
panties.
The front panel of the garment and crotch were both cut as one. Other
variations include little pleated or flared over skirts with the idea of
covering saddlebag thighs.
By the late sixties swimsuits had revealing side mesh net panels or cut
out midriffs filled in with see through plastic rings. The swimsuit did its
best to keep up with competition from the two-piece bikini by abbreviating
it even further by cutting the legs higher as well as straight across. What
is now thought of as high leg is much higher than the high leg of 1970
over 30 years ago and the phrase 'low leg' is now used to name the
sixties high cut leg.
The Bikini
In 1946 Louis Réard, a former automotive engineer and the son of a lingerie
shop owner, joined the hundreds thronging St. Tropez on the French
Mediterranean in the euphoria following the end of the Nazi occupation. There
he noticed that juenes filles rolled down the waists of their two-pieces and
hitched up their tops to catch more sun. This inspired his bikini, a tiny number
named after an atoll where the United States had tested the atomic bomb. It
consisted basically of two triangles of fabric on the top and two more, front
and back, on the bottom.
He introduced his creation at a fashion event at Piscine Molitor, a popular
public pool in Paris. He couldn’t find a model willing to wear such an outfit, so
the bikini made its debut on a stripper, Micheline Bernardini. Réard promoted
his bathing suit by selling it in a matchbox and declared, “A bikini is not a
bikini unless it can be pulled through a wedding ring.” Around the same time
Jacques Heim, known for classic sportswear designs, introduced the “Atome,”
which he dubbed “the smallest bathing suit in the world.”
Both designs lived up to their explosive names with the controversy they
garnered. The bikini was banned in both Italy and Spain, where the authorities
led tourists wearing it off the beach. The American fashion industry was
appalled. As late as 1957 Modern Girl magazine wrote, “It is hardly necessary
to waste words on the so-called bikini, since it is inconceivable that any girl
with tact and decency would ever wear such a thing.” American women still
typically wrapped themselves in architectonic swimwear with menacingly
conical bras.
But others, particularly French vacationers, were delighted. “Remember that
no one had been to the beach in years,” said Jamie Samet, a fashion writer
for Le Figaro. “People were craving the simple pleasures of the sea and the
sun. For women, wearing a bikini signaled a kind of second liberation. There
was really nothing sexual about this. It was instead a celebration of freedom
and a return to the joys in life.”
The bikini took off as a global phenomenon thanks to Brigitte Bardot. The
young French actress wore hers scandalously low on her hips with a barelythere top—when she wore a top at all. With her cascading blonde hair and
complete comfort with her body, she became the big screen’s first sex kitten.
The success her 1956 film . . . And God Created Woman was not lost on
American actresses. Marilyn Monroe tossed her swimming trunks for a pair of
white panties and a bandeau top, and others followed.
By the early sixties, the bikini had taken hold in America. In 1960 Brian
Hyland’s paean to it, “Itsy Bitsy Teeny Weeny Yellow Polka Dot Bikini,”
made the top ten. Annette Funicello, who started out as a Mouseketeer,
donned a bikini in the movie Beach Party in 1963 and made such a hit
that six sequels followed, including How to Stuff a Wild Bikini.
In the fifties the bikini was still thought of as risqué and best suited to film
stars and strippers, but a tame version of the fashion a two-piece playsuit
was often seen as were skirted 1950s swimsuits.
The first bikini worn by a stripper in 1947
Below is a 1970’s swimsuit and of course Elle McPherson in an 80’s high cut.
Swimwear in the 20th Century Quiz
1. What fabric were the 1920’s bathing suits made of?
2. Where did the leg of the 1920’s swimsuit stop?
3. What type of Hollywood films promoted the swimsuit?
4. Who were the famous Hollywood stars that promoted the swimsuit in
1930’s?
5. In the 1940’s what was the reason that corset manufacturers made
swimwear?
6. What decade was lycra invented?
7. What year was the bikini invented and by whom?
8. Who designed a topless swimsuit in the 1970’s?
9. What was the typical 1980’s swimsuit cut?
Draw the following swimsuits, 1920’s, 1940’s, 1970’s and 1980’s.
on a separate piece of paper.
Please hand it in with your quiz answers next week.