"A billow of chiffon" (Vanity Fair, June 1956)

 Here we have a couple of wildly romantic dance dresses in chiffon.  (The one in the background is "ballerina length", or just reaching to the bottom of the calf.)  The object of fashions like these was to look attractive in a ladylike way rather than being blatantly sexy.

OUR COVER GIRLS... dance in a billow of chiffon... two versions of the same dress, by Roecliff & Chapman... candy pink... pineapple ice... note the longer length.

Vanity Fair's "VANITIES" column noted some of the latest fashion trends for June 1956:

NEW AGAIN... THE ORGANDIE BLOUSE (Dior showed it time and again with his little city suits.)  Make it like a shirt in whitest cotton organdie and let the collar turn over the collar of your suit's jacket...

NEW ANCHORAGE...  for a floating, fragile , tulle stole... wear it straight across your throat, held in position by ropes of pears, the ends of the stole flung over your shoulder and flying free.

PRETTIEST POSSIBLE WAY TO LOOK...for the season's most formal occasion... carry a sunshade to match your dress... perfect for a garden party, Henley or Ascot... and a wonderful way to shelter a sun-shy skin.

HOW MANY SUMMER DRESSES IN YOUR WARDROBE?  Collecting summer prints can be an expensive business... Easiest to wear... the rose prints (that Dior adores and uses time and again; Digby Morton, too), the Van Gogh prints, mere smudges of colours, exquisitely merged, spots, diamonds (in fact most geometricals).  If you can be really strong-minded... keep your prints colour coordinated so that you can indulge in a brilliant pair of shoes.

Australian Home Journal, September 1955

 The free patterns for Spring "frocks" which came with the September 1955 issue of the Australian Home Journal were so typical of their era that they've almost become cliches.  They are all variations of styles which combine cinched-in waists with bouffant, calf-length skirts.  The artist who illustrated them for the cover of the magazine has accessorised them with hats and white gloves.  The two figures on the right are wearing fashions for younger women: the woman on the left is wearing a "matron's frock" designed for older women.

As usual the Australian Home Journal has lots of fashion news and advice, including some suggestions on how to spark up your accessories!

Full-skirted, sleeveless cotton frocks are featured in teenage styles for the coming season.  In bright prints or soft pastels, many of them have special petticoats or hip stiffening to accent their swirling skirts.  Simplicity of design is combined with trends which characterise the spring silhouette for adults.  The elongated line is seen in long torso dresses and in frock with a hipline emphasis (a band of braid, velvet or ribbon extending extending around the skirt at hip level is one of the ways in which this is achieved).

Coat frocks, buttoning from neck to hem, have established themselves as  a classic which appears in many attractive versions nowadays, from slim sheaths to styles with graceful fullness in the skirt.  Their capacity to look equally dressy when worn on their own or when partnered with a coat makes them a particularly practical style.

Fashion's latest . . . Add a rhinestone buckle to a belt, the bow of a sash, or the centre or side of a scoop neckline: stitch brilliants to the curve of a turn-down collar or add a rose to either corner: pull a pert white organdie bow through slots at the jewel neckline of a dark frock: stitch groups of gay glass beads on to a cinch belt: brighten a round necked sweater with a collar of vivid felt flowers sewn on to a foundation.

"Choose Partners... Change Partners" (Good Neighbor Club Plan, Spring and Summer1954)

 At first glance, these demure, ladylike separates look as if they would have been right at home at the turn of the century—skirt lengths excepted, of course!

For the Beach (Vogue, British edition, July 1953)

 The 1950s aren't usually thought of as a decade of daring fashion innovation, but this model is wearing shorts that would have been considered daringly brief by the standards of the 1930s or 1940s (the better to show off her long tanned legs!)  Of course this outfit would never have been worn anywear but a beach, or possibly the wearer's own back yard.  That's a pity, because this outfit is undeniably stylish.

COVER: latest in beach news—tan tones to match your sun tan—worn with mouth-melting pastels.

Unfortunately for the curious fashion historian, Vogue doesn't provide much information about this outfit, such as: Who designed or manufactured it? What was it made of?  My guess is cotton, which, then as now, was popular for informal summer wear.

Butterick Pattern Book, Fall 1952

 In Fall 1952, Butterick Pattern Book showed readers how one pattern would look made up in two different fabrics.

on the Front Cover

One pattern equals two dresses... or as many dresses as you wish!  All you do is make the same design in a variety of fabrics.  We show you an example on the Front Cover of this issue... Butterick design 6292 is made in a dark grey crepe for daytime wear and in subtle pink silk taffeta for late day and evening occasions.  You could make the same designs in various other fabrics such as; wool crepe, wool jersey, flannel, rayon jersey, faille, cotton jersey, gold or silver printed cottons, Shantung in silk, rayon or cotton, Jacquards, brocades, surah and many blends.. wool and rayon, wool and nylon, orlon and nylon.

(Capitalisation and ellipses as they appeared in the original.)

The design is classic 1950s.  I've been trying to imagine how it would look made up in the different fabrics listed above!

David Jones catalogue (Autumn and Winter 1951)

 These pictures came from David Jones's Autumn and Winter catalogue of 1951.  David Jones was (and is!) an upmarket department store, and its catalogues were aimed at its country customers.  The clothes advertised inside would have been good quality, but fairly conservative in style.

Apart from that I don't have much to say about the fashions below.  Let the pictures speak for themselves.

JAEGER coats box or belted style, all fully-lined

These beautifully tailored coats are made in camel-coloured wool and fully lined with good quality lining.  In cosy "Jaeger" with easy-fitting raglan sleeves, you'll be ready for the coldest winter.  Each has vent back.

"Bridal Fashions" (Australian Women's Weekly, June 17 1950)

 After the distressed 1930s and the turbulent 1940s came the placid and conservative 1950s.  The parents of the baby boomers were getting married and settling down in the suburbs, so I think that a bridal gown is the perfect way to kick off this decade.

This is a classically simple dress, made in what appears to be satin.  You'll notice that though it is quite décolleté it has sleeves and covers the model's shoulders.  This is because bare shoulders were not acceptable at a church wedding in the 1950s (and brides wearing this kind of dress would have almost certainly have been married in a church).

For some reason I couldn't find a description of the dress on the cover of this issue of The Australian Women's Weekly. (There were, however, plenty of other bridal designs inside the magazine, which you can browse here.)  And of course there were plenty of ideas in the issue's advice column:

As a constant follower of your dress column I am seeking your advice about my wedding frock.  Clothes are so expensive to buy, I wondered if it would be possible to have a frock I could convert after the wedding into a dress for dances.  Would a removable train be suitable and possible?  I am having white silk organdie for the frock, and as I am rather a girlish type I thought a frilly trim would be nice.

White silk organdie with self-pleated ruffles for the trim would be charming for a spring wedding.  The train could be made detatchable (yes, I think it an excellent idea) at the waistline.  Have the bodice top form-fitting with long sleeves plus a ruffle to form a yoke effect.  Later, sleeves and yoke can be revised.  Have the ruffle again to finish the hemline and outlining a long, oval-shaped train.

"Dress sense" by Betty Keep, Australian Women's Weekly, June 17 1950

June is in winter in Australia, so the fashions depicted here would probably been used in planning a spring wedding in September or October.

Vogue Pattern Book (British edition, Autumn 1949)

Since I began the decade with a Vogue pattern for a suit which could be worn as separates, I thought I'd end it with a Vogue pattern for a dress and jacket that looks like a suit.

ON THE COVER.  Matched colour—contrasted texture: an oatmeal jersey dress buttoning from neck to hem at back; oatmeal tweed jacket.

 Fitted and buttoned down the back—the very reverse of wartime practicality!

1949 saw the end of clothes rationing in Britain (it ended a year earlier in Australia).  The British edition of Vogue Pattern Book, which had been subsumed into Vogue magazine was once again being published separately.  Britain was still a long way from being a consumer society, but it was on the road to recovery.

"Those Extra Inches" (Needlework Illustrated no. 192, 1948)

 1948 and in the teeth of much opposition the verdict was in: women wanted to wear "New Look" (longer, fuller) style skirts.  Perhaps they were longing for some femininity and a dash of luxury after years of wartime austerity.  The problem was that, three years after World War II ended, there were still shortages of, well, nearly everything.  This was especially so in Britain where rationing and regulations still dictated fashions.  This is where Needlework Illustrated stepped in, offering its readers ideas for turning their dowdy "old look" skirts into exciting "New Look" styles.

Wakes, Winter 1947

 In the annals of high fashion, 1947 was the year in which Christian Dior unleashed his "New Look" upon the world.  It made a big splash in the news internationally.  The makers of everyday fashion, however, decided to play things safe. How could they tell whether they were looking at a genuine shift or just a passing fad?  This was especially pertinent when you consider that many countries still had rationing and/or shortages of materials.

The fashions from Wakes catalogue below illustrate this approach.  Waists are slightly emphasised, but shoulders remain broad.  Skirts are fuller, but still only come down a little way below the knee.

THREE PIECE ENSEMBLE

CYCLAMEN-RED AND JET BLACK team together in an all-wool ensemble incorporating all the new season's newest features.  The collarless jacket comes in the gorgeous new Cyclamen-Red illustrated.  Cut in 7 figure-hugging gores, with divinely figure fitted back, darted front panels and simulated hip pockets.  Appliqued Jet-Black motif on the front, smoothly tailored shoulders, narrow tie in front half belt.  The pencil slim skirt has a graceful long inverted pleat both front and back, dart-fitted back, firm waistband—zip placket.  The prophetic three-quarter length coat picks up the cyclamen-red in its appliqued shoulder motif, features full-cut sleeves, twin pockets, poker straight shoulders, boxy cut.  The three pieces team together, or form the basis of a wardrobe worn individually. 

 

Australian Home Journal, July 1946

 What were postwar fashions like?  As you can see from the picture below, in the short term very little changed for the average woman.  Perhaps they were  allowed an embellishment or two (like the peplum worn by the figure on the left) but rationing was still in force in most countries, and economy was still the order of the day.

So what were the emerging fashion trends of 1946?  Oddly, for this date, there was very little information in the July issue of the Australian Home Journal as the magazine's fashion correspondent appears to have gone missing in action.  Fortunately for us, there were lots of interesting snippits of information in other publications.

"Make Yourself a Summer Hat" (Stitchcraft, May-June 1945)

 In 1945 "make do and mend" was still very much in fashion.  Magazines were full of ideas for renovating, restyling and repurposing old garments.  This issue of Stitchcraft contained instructions on how to convert old clothes into a new hat.

The coloured picture shows this really elegant hat turned up at the side.  [Below], the girl has decided to wear the brim down all round.  Be sure to wear the hat dead straight on your head.

Materials: The original model was made from an old pair of silk stockinette knickers, dyed turquoise.  However, if you're at all like us you will not want to part with such a useful garment, and so prefer to copy it in material from an old flowered evening frock, gingham, cretonne or velvet.  It doesn't really matter what you choose so long as you follow the diagrams carefully.

You will need a piece of spartra or buckram, 21 by 18 inches, for stiffening, a yard of ribbon for trimming, and binding for inside headband.

Making: Cut out spartra as diagrams A, C, and D.  Cut out the V in the back of brim as shown, and join up cut ends with light but firm overstitching.

In same way join short ends of crown piece.  Start by making the crown first.  Cover the top C with a piece of material, tacking raw edges on to under side firmly, then stitching lightly on same side, so that the stitches do not show through.

Now cut a piece of material for crown 23 by 7 inches.  Arrange this over crown as in diagram B, gathering the top edge as indicated. The dotted line represents the line of the spartra crown under the fabric.  Now turn up this superfluous material, so that it acts as a lining to the crown, gather it, to match the first lot of gathers, and stitch together with previous gathers.

Stitch top neatly over the hole, pinching the crown to make a hard line for centre-front as shown in photograph.

For the brim, cut a piece of material 36 by 7¼ inches.  Fold over the brim, and sew along the edges of material with a fine running stitch, not sewing any of the buckram or spartra.  This line of stitching is on the inner edge of your circle.  Gather up so that the folds are evenly arranged.  Join the ends of the fabric neatly at back of brim.

Place crown over the brim, so that all raw edges are inside; stitch firmly.  Trim off raw edges of brim materialso that only about ¼ to ½ an inch remains.  Finish off this untidy edge with a piece of ribbon or bias binding.

Neaten the inside of the top with a piece of material cut in the same way as for top.  Sew on hat elastic and trim with ribbon.

Spartra was an open weave straw material, used to create the foundations of hats.  Alas, it is no longer produced.  Buckram, a stiff, supporting material, is still available if anyone wants to try making this hat.

Pedal Pushers (Life, August 28, 1944)

 If women in some countries were repurposing old zips to make jewellry, and old curtains to make aprons, women in other countries had enough resources to pursue the occasional fashion whimsy.  I'm referring here to "pedal pushers", which first appeared on the cover of Life in 1944 as a youthful fad.

"PEDAL PUSHERS"

This fall college girls will wear a new kind of knee-length shorts

For years male bicyclists have had the sensible custom of rolling up the right trouser leg to avoid tangling with the chain.  When college girls took to riding bicycles in slacks, they first rolled up one trouser leg, then rolled up both.  This whimsy has now produced a trim variety of long shorts, called "pedal pushers".  Introduced at recent college fashion shows, they look like little boys' short pants.

Best footwear with pedal pushers are moccasins.  Since these are rationed, girls this summer have been going barefoot (see cover) and they are expected to appear on campuses this fall in bare feet.  But bare feet are not allowed in class.  In some places pedal pushers themselves will not be allowed in classrooms.

Most Eastern colleges will permit girls to were pedal pushers on the campus.  Some of them (Smith, Vassar, Mount Holyoke, Sarah Lawrence) will also permit them to go to classes.  California colleges will have none of them either in class or on campus.  The University of Kansas begs the question by saying that these knee-length shorts are permissible "if they look enough like a skirt to fool a nearsighted professor."

In some ways these garments seem the epitome of wartime praticality and economy: practical because they made riding a bicycle easier, and economic because they didn't use much material.  It's clear that some conservatives in the older generation didn't approve of them, but that probably made them all the more appealing to the girls who wore them!

Pedal pushers would go on to be a post-war staple in American casual wear.  Once they moved from campuses to the suburbs they'd change slightly in design, becoming a little bit longer and a lot slimmer.  I wonder how many of the young students mentioned in the article above continued wearing pedal pushers as adults?

On Making Do (Stitchcraft 1943)

 Every country caught up in the Second World War was affected by civilian shortages, but some countries were more affected than others.  These magazines, published in Great Britain, are full of tips and projects for making the most of a limited clothing ration.

Knitting, as always, was a popular pastime.  Since it was important to use as little yarn as possible, designers started creating patterns for tight, waist-length jumpers in stitches that saved wool.  Multi-coloured patterns (as in the hat and gloves below) became popular as a way of using up odds and ends.  If all else failed, knitters could always unravel an old garment, and use the wool to knit something new!

Now on to the magazines.

January 1943

The cover shows a ribbed jumper with a camels in cross stich on the yoke.  Other contents include patterns for detachable collars made of wool (only half an ounce of wool for each!) , a pattern for an apron to make out of old blackout curtain, and a pattern for "sockettes" to be worn to save one's precious stockings.

Wakes, Winter 1942

Japan entered the war in 1942, and for the first time Australia had the enemy on their doorstep.  However, Australian manufacturers were still capable of turning out stylish outfits like the coat and muff (with matching hat) illustrated on the cover of the catalogue below.

COAT AND MUFF, 5 GNS.

A three piece ensemble (the hat sells separately) with furrier-made tawny luxurious leopard-dyed coney fur, mounted on a brilliant Loyal Blue English all wool coating.  Seven panel, slim as a whistle princess with new lines in every inch from moulded, semi-extended, immaculate shoulders to flared full hem.  British rayon lined throughout.  Matched skins and material in the zip closing muff purse.

Australia's Lost Department Stores IX: McDowells (Spring & Summer 1941-42)

McDowells was one of Sydney's smaller department stores, and like so many others, began as a drapery in the 19th century.  It was founded as John McDowell and Partners in 1889, and became McDowell and Coogan in 1893 when one of the original partners dropped out.  In 1895 it became McDowell and Hughes, when Hughes bought out Coogan, finally becoming McDowells Ltd in 1917.  

McDowells prided itself of old-fashioned service and providing value for money.  Staff often spent their whole careers there, and discipline was considered to be firm, but fair.  (That didn't stop one enterprising manager stealing 70 dozen pairs of stockings from his employer in the early 1920s!)  Notably, McDowells refused to reduce the pay of its employees during the Great Depression.

McDowells did a lot of business via mail-order catalogue, which brings me to this publication from 1941.

The front cover hopes "for a brighter year!" but history tells us that they would be disappointed.  Meanwhile they were advertising a "FROCK you will love to wear to any function" in "SHEER GEORGETTE", a "FLORAL FROCK" in crepe with a silhouette "emphasised by the drama of a WHIRL OF PLEATS", a "WASHING FROCK attractively styled in ... a good quality LINEN LIKE FABRIC" and lastly, a dress cut with "9 complete Gores" in a "Flower-splashed distinctive SUEDE CREPE".

It's a fairly good selection of early wartime fashions, but as wartime economies bit clothes would become less generous in their use of materials.  Tucks, pleats and 9-gored skirts would no longer be allowed.

Vogue Pattern Book (June 1940)

 War or no war, Vogue Patterns was still capable of producing glamorous and sophisticated patterns.  Illustrated on the cover of the June 1940 Vogue Pattern Book is pattern S-4189 for a skirt, a blouse and a jacket.

S-4189——RIDING HABIT JACKETS will make your town suit look crisply English and pay homage to the flared-hip silhouette above a slim skirt.

Suits and separates would remain staples during the war years, though as time went on the cut of this jacket would be seen as wasteful.

This is the British edition of Vogue Pattern Book.  It would have gone to press around the time of Dunkirk, and subsequent issues during the Battle of Britain and the Blitz.  Though the patterns would have been the same as the ones in the American edition, the war crept in via the editorial content.  This issue warns readers of possible fabric shortages as British manufactures are exported to pay for the war effort. The October issue warns readers of a possible purchase tax on paper patterns (a tax had been imposed on clothes that month) while the December issue exhorts them to be economical.

Eventually, due to paper shortages, the British edition of Vogue Pattern Book would cease publication as a separate magazine, and would not resume until some years after the war.

"What the Parisienne is Wearing" (Woman's Journal, May 1939)

 I'm going to have one last fling with the frivolities of Haute Couture, before I settle down to the years of austerity, rationing and "make do and mend".  And it seems that the designers of 1939 were also having a last fling in the shadow of war.  Moma Clarke wrote in the May issue of Woman's Journal:

All the Paris dressmakers have "gone" womanly in the most feminine sense of the word... Schiaparelli announces that "women are ladies again".  One dares not reflect on the interim.  Better not...

It's one of the minor what-ifs of history: if there had been no Second World War, would fashion have given us a "New Look" a decade earlier than it did?

On to the designers—and we have some familiar names at this point.

Summer fashion plans have turned topsey-turvey. Instead of a plain suit with a figured blouse it is the other way about, and a gaily flowered tailor-made is the order of the going.  Jean Patou makes this delectable suit of brown and white figured crêpe with a white crêpe blouse, and the blue flowered ensemble of glazed cotton with a white piqué waistcoat.  Never have pastel shades been so loved.  A dress and coat matching in a pastel coloured crêpe is as chic as anything can be—especially when trimmed with scalloping, as in this lovely pastel blue dress and coat by Patou.

Patou died in 1936, but the house he founded lived on.  I have no information on who actually designed these dresses. 

New Fashions For You and Your Home (Singer, Fall-Winter 1938)

 Shown below is part of Vogue Pattern No. 8129, an evening dress "with a redingote over an independent slip-dress".  This is clearly the "slip dress"part of the design.  A small illustration of the "redingote", made up in lace, is inside the magazine.

Back in my very first post for this year I mentioned the introduction of the first backless evening dresses during World War I.  In they 1930s they were almost de rigueur in formal evening gowns, though they could be covered up by garments like the redingote included with this pattern.

All in all, there seems to have been quite a variety in evening fashions in 1938!  The Australian Home Journal reports:

In the evening we see princess dresses with drapings that stress the wearer's slenderness; further, there come dresses which cling till the knees and then start into greater width; some skirts are slit and somewhat cut away in front, trailing at the back in a line, and there are also reminiscences of the Empire, the Directoire and the 1889 style.

Australian Home Journal, May 1938

Hats For Summer (Le Petit Echo de la Mode, 13 juin 1937)

What smart outfit doesn't need a hat to complete it?

A few posts ago I showed you a typical hat from the beginning of the decade: close fitting and brimless.  These hats from 1937 seem to have gone to the opposite extreme, with wide brims and very shallow crowns.  (The crowns are so shallow that the artist depicting these hats makes it look as if the models have had the tops of their heads sliced off!)

The hats are worn tilted over one eye, and as we can see from the right-hand figure, held on by a band passing around the back of the head.

POUR L'ÉTÉ

Grande CAPELINE de paille fine, avec calotte basse ceinturée d'un ruban.  Bouquet de petite fleurs multicolores.

CANOTIER avec cache-peigne en fleurs de velours.  Voiletts posée un arrière.

[FOR SUMMER

Large straw hat with a low crown tied with a ribbon. Bouquet of small multicolored flowers.

Boater hat with a velvet floral comb cover. Veil draped at the back.]

Straw was the most popular material for summer hats, with felt being more commonly worn in winter.