Beginning of the jazz era fashion:
With the spread of the woman's Suffrages it lead towards the magnitude of change not only in how woman perceived themselves and how they acted but also in their change of fashion and changing the norm for many modern woman after the war.
The Great War saw to it that the jobs of 'men' would be given to the only available people which happened to be the woman left behind. This sparked the official change in the roles & aesthetics of woman; allowing them control over self-expression.
Fashion took a simplification process after the Great War rejecting the heavily layered Victorian era formalities and embraced the loose, free natural shapes and light weight designs that came with the economic changes of that time; recovering from war meant less money, less imports and less materials. This lead too many chose to create their own from cheaper material; and thankfully from the basic designs it was easy for woman to create their own similar and unique designs, keeping with trends and high fashion throughout the 1920's.
Women’s Fashion in the 1920s By Guest Blogger Joy Bennett Pasted from <https://hancockhistoricalmuseum.org/i-love-the-1920s/womens-fashion-in-the-1920s/
Introduction to 20’s fashion:
The 1920’s (also known as the roaring 20’s) will forever be remembered and romanticised for it's Great Gatsby glamour and glitz and the Jazz era. During this time woman were starting to make a stand against the norm, from shorter hair to shorter skirts.
The design we all know and love was popularised by many (one that stands out among the rest would be the well-known 'Coco Channel'), known as 'La Garçonne' known by popularity as 'The Flapper'
The Flapper design consisted of a dropped waist & creeping hemline dresses, long necklaces and cloche hats (throughout the 1920's both would be lowered and raised, creating varying looks and lengths in the dresses).
The popularity of short hair on woman was on the up rise with styles such as the Shingle and the Eton crop becoming extremely popular; bobs… bobs everywhere!
1920-1929 Posted by Karina Reddy | Last updated Aug 18, 2020 | Published on May 11, 2018 | 1920-1929, 20th century, decade overview From <https://fashionhistory.fitnyc.edu/1920-1929/> Link: https://fashionhistory.fitnyc.edu/1920-1929/
To go with the short hair styles Cloche hat came into popularity, with how their shape perfectly sat on top of the styles (Eventually 1930's rolled around like the fashion started to get longer again, not only with skirts but also including woman growing their hair out again came back into fashion).
1920-1929 Posted by Karina Reddy | Last updated Aug 18, 2020 | Published on May 11, 2018 | 1920-1929, 20th century, decade overview From <https://fashionhistory.fitnyc.edu/1920-1929/>
In the beginning of the 20's on the shoe front the curved vintage heel was popular till half way through the decade when the heel design was swapped out for a military or Cuban heel; this made the more modern look that people are fond of. This design change created a cut off from the 19th century shoe designs (The military and Cuban heel are still seen as a more practical design and is still used on many shoes nowadays).
Many popular shoe styles were ones such as the Mary Jane, Lattice Pumps, Colonial Pumps, Step-In Pumps, T-Strap Heels, Oxford Shoes, Tennis Shoes, Sandals, Lace-Up Boots, Russian Boots, Galoshes and Overshoes.
Like the heel the toes for shoes went under a change throughout the 20’s staring off with a pointed toe in the beginning, moving onto a rounded toe and then slowly becoming square towards the end of the decade.
Leather shoes continued to be the main material of most shoes only walking and worker shoes had rubber heels and soles; this was due to comfort reasons and would assist people who would be on their feet for many hours a day [Other popular materials for shoes consisted of Calfskin, Goatskin, Kidskin, Suede & Reptile Scales (lizard, alligator, etc.)].
witness2fashion B. Altman catalog 1920s twenties sears-1924-fall-shoes-color-50031899_b011766-00269 https://witness2fashion.wordpress.com/tag/b-altman-catalog-1920s-twenties/
Most popular colours for the shoes in the 1920s were black, brown, grey and beige. They would take these colours and pick two contrasting ones to create elaborate designs from colour blocking, texture blocking to creating unique swirls on the body and strap of the shoes. The art deco style of shoe did not come in to fashion till towards the end of the decade, when shoes would come with bold colours such as red, blue and white combinations.
Evening Wear Basic:
Evening wear usually followed the casual wear design (full length gowns were
still available but these were made from light weight material layered upon each other, giving off the illusion of large fancy gowns but they were still very economically designed [A lot of the full length gowns and clothing designs did not come back into popularity till the 1930's]). Evening wear could be told apart from the casual wear by the ornate decorations that has always caught the eye of modern fashion lovers: Beads, Sequences and Embroidery adornments.
Women’s Fashion in the 1920s By Guest Blogger Joy Bennett Pasted from <https://hancockhistoricalmuseum.org/i-love-the-1920s/womens-fashion-in-the-1920s/>
Casual Sportswear:
Sportswear is a popular choice of casual wear nowadays but the beginning of the popularisation of the trend was during the 1920s; so woman could now normalise sportswear just like men had already been doing.
Glamour Daze: a vintage fashion and beauty archive History of Women’s 1920s Fashion – 1920 to 1929 Coco-Chanel-suits-Paris-1926-e1588767653401 https://glamourdaze.com/history-of-womens-fashion/1920-to-1929
As usual many well-known brands contributed to the up rise of the casual sports look; most notably would be Jean Patou with the iconic yellow skirt & sweater combo in a tennis design.
Tennis like now had a tight grip on sports lovers back in the 20's with a large majority of the sportswear fashion taking inspiration from tennis outfits.
[The sleeveless and knee length pleated tennis dress became so popular it would be warn as event pieces to restaurants during the day; sometimes even up to cocktail hour.]
Notice how there was no mention of a feather boa... #justsayin
Hopefully you found some useful pointers in here, or maybe you just like fashion history... either way we hope it was a good read.
This Blog was written and sourced by:
Emily Wiles
We look forward to the next one. :) x