From the Dress-Up Box, 1970s Style (Lana Lobell, Summer 1972)

 

In any era, fashion designers like to borrow, but the designers of the early seventies took a really eclectic approach.  For example, let's take a look at this spread from the Lana Lobell catalog of Summer 1972.

 

Figure A, on the left is wearing a very up-to-the-minute style, made up in a traditional Turkish print.  Though it looks like the model is wearing a wraparound skirt over a top and a pair of short shorts, in fact she's wearing a "shortjump", or cut-down jumpsuit, under her skirt.  The whole thing is made in acetate jersey—artificial fibres for the win!

Figure B, in the centre, has gone all out (to sea) in a jumpsuit based on a traditional sailor suit.  Need I add it's made up in rayon acetate crepe?

Figures C and D on the right are wearing a cheongsam (from "The Orient ... Land of Beauty!").  It's made in taffeta lined acetate, designed to look like Thai silk.  Modern westerners would hesitate to wear it, but the cheongsam was briefly fashionable in the 1960s and 1970s thanks to the influence of the movies.