A Cultural History of Dress and Fashion in the Modern Age

Alexandra Palmer

• Publisher: Bloomsbury Visual Arts
• Year: 2018
• ISBN:
  9781350114050
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Design
• Subtopic: Modedesign

Over the last century there has been a complete transformation of the fashion system. The unitary top-down fashion cycle has been replaced by the pulsations of multiple and simultaneous styles, while the speed of global production and circulation has become ever faster and more complex. Running in tandem, the development of artificial fibres has revolutionized the composition of clothing, and the increased focus on youth, sexuality, and the body has radically changed its design. From the 1920s flapper dress to debates over the burkini, fashion has continued to be deeply involved in society's larger issues. Drawing on a wealth of visual, textual and object sources and illustrated with 100 images, A Cultural History of Dress and Fashion in the Modern Age presents essays on textiles, production and distribution, the body, belief, gender and sexuality, status, ethnicity, and visual and literary representations to illustrate the diversity and cultural significance of dress and fashion in the period.

CHAPTER ONE

Textiles

SUSAN WARD

The relationship between textiles and fashion in any era is complex, multi-layered, and constantly changing; this was particularly true during the twentieth century, which saw sweeping cultural, economic, and industrial changes worldwide. With this larger context in mind, this chapter discusses broad trends in textile manufacture and use for fashionable clothing worn during the twentieth century. Highlighted are the moments when trends changed direction, or new trends emerged. I draw on existing studies of the artistic, economic, technological, and cultural changes affecting the use of textiles in fashion.

As someone who grew up learning to sew garments and visiting fabric stores during the “fiber wars” of the 1970s, I have also taken a more pragmatic approach. For each period I have asked simple questions about the kinds of textiles available and the kinds of garments that were constructed. What were the most important new kinds of fibers, fabrics, and finishes? What new silhouettes or kinds of garments did those textiles make possible, and/or did they change existing styles? And from the garment/fashion point of view, what new silhouettes, approaches to using fabrics, or wardrobe needs were introduced? What kinds of textiles did those new styles require, and what textiles were developed in response?

The answers to these questions require an understanding of the ever-shifting interplay between design innovation and style leadership, scientific and technological innovation, and economic, lifestyle, and geopolitical developments. Addressed are questions of availability, of style, aesthetics, and performance—what textiles can do, and what they are asked to do, and how that changed over the century.

What emerges is often surprising. First, many of the familiar fashion milestones appear to be “missing” from this history. This is not because they were unimportant, but because they were not primarily about innovative textiles or textile use. For example, exaggerated shoulders were a near-universal feature of women’s fashionable clothing from the mid-1930s through the 1940s, but the style was not associated with any particular kind of textile. This look could be, and was, easily achieved using traditional construction methods, in the fabrics already in use, from stiff woven wools to fluid rayon crepe. Second, developments across the century seem to tell two overarching stories. The proliferation of man-made fibers, the so-called “fiber revolution,” transformed both the fiber and textile industries, as well as wardrobes worldwide. It set in motion processes and debates that continue into the twenty-first century. Coinciding with this revolution was the rise of knitwear and knitted textiles. The development of knitting, as Schoeser has noted, “has been responsible for the most striking and fundamental changes in textiles and clothing” over the last several centuries. Much of this change took place during the twentieth century, and an estimated one in five garments worn today is knitted or made of knit fabric.¹

Fashion textile innovations and influences come from many sources, as the textile and fashion industries comprise a vast, interactive, and highly structured system. There are many ways in which “new” textiles and looks can be created and popularized. The fashion leadership of Paris haute couturiers, for example, depended upon textile manufacturers continually developing new designs, colors, structure, and texture. The manufacturers in turn relied upon well-developed networks of fiber manufacturers, spinners, dyers, and printers to produce new textile effects, and relied upon the couture designers to create garments that showed off their textiles to best advantage.² Although few consumers could afford the highly publicized, combined fashion-and-textile creations of the Paris couture, they were important trend-setters for both fashions and textiles. Similar dynamics between designers and manufacturers played out at all levels down the fashion chain, and continued as other style sources began to supplant the couture. The designers and companies mentioned in this discussion are exemplars; they were not the only innovators or important contributors at a particular time but were chosen because they exemplify a trend, or were particularly innovative in their use of textiles.

INTER-WAR: 1918–30s

The Rise of Man-made Fibers and Modern Textures

The years of the First World War brought tremendous changes to world economies and industries, and marked a turning point in the history of man-made fibers. Before the war, Germany was the leading producer of synthetic dyes. On March 1, 1915 the British instituted a blockade on German ports. World access to the best coal-tar dyes and other chemical products was cut off. As Field and Blaszczyk have discussed, the “dye crisis” that followed was especially disruptive to manufacturers in the United States, with its highly developed textile industry.³ The dye shortage, along with wartime needs for products such as medicines and explosives, spurred on the rapid establishment of the American chemical industry, and laid the groundwork for the production of man-made fibers on an industrial scale.

Before the twentieth century, virtually all textiles were made of mechanically processed yarns from plant and animal fibers. The most commonly used natural fibers for clothing are cotton and linen, processed from plants; wool, cashmere, and other animal-hairs; and silk, obtained from the cocoons of silk worms. The term “man-made,” or “artificial,” is used to describe a fiber that is not found in nature, although some are chemically derived from natural materials. Such fibers are usually created using a chemical solution or liquid from which fibers or filaments can be drawn or spun.

The first successful man-made fibers were invented in the nineteenth century and were developed from cellulose, a natural polymer found in plant materials such as wood pulp. Called “cellulosic” or “semi-synthetic” fibers, they include viscose (also called viscose rayon, or simply rayon) and acetate (cellulose acetate), also marketed under the trade name “Celanese.” Synthetic fibers, by contrast, are not derived from natural materials, but are made by building up (synthesizing) complex chemical structures from simpler chemicals. The first of these was nylon (also known as polyamide), introduced in 1938. Other synthetic fibers that have been important for fashion textiles include acrylic and polyester.⁴

Man-made fibers derived from cellulose were already the basis of successful industries in European countries before the war, but American manufacturers had been suspicious of them, and were highly successful in the production and use of cotton, wool and silk. This situation changed rapidly after the war. In the early 1920s, the US chemical corporations that manufactured so-called “artificial silk” (renamed “rayon” in 1924) became major players in the American textile industry. Man-made fibers gained increasing acceptance through the 1920s, largely driven by the market research and promotional efforts of major fiber manufacturers such as E.I. du Pont de Nemours and Company (DuPont) in the US, and Courtaulds in the UK.⁵ In the US, rayon and acetate had previously been used primarily as a cheaper substitute for silk in hosiery and knitted goods, or blended with natural fibers. The appearance of all-rayon fabrics toward the end of the decade paralleled the growing importance of the ready-to-wear industry; as rayon was roughly one third the price of silk in the late 1920s, such fabrics appealed to price-conscious US garment manufacturers, and greatly expanded the range of “silky” garments available in the mass market.⁶

The shift from custom-made and home-sewn garments to ready-to-wear brought major changes at all levels of the fashion and textile industries.⁷ Textile manufacturers, who had previously marketed their fabrics directly to consumers and dressmakers, were now relying on clients in the garment industry, and were under constant pressure to bring down costs.⁸ Keeping the price of clothing low became even more important after the stock market crash of 1929 ushered in the Great Depression, resulting in the collapse of the American silk industry along with many other textile and apparel manufacturers worldwide.

Textured fabrics of all kinds also assumed new importance in fashion in the inter-war years. The 1915 dye crisis stimulated interest in new textures as a substitute for color and prompted manufacturers to experiment with undyed raw and wild (tussah) silk, an irregular, inexpensive fiber that had rarely before been used for high-fashion fabrics.⁹ The resulting rough-textured silk fabrics, known as “sport silks,” were in tune with the more practical mood of wartime fashion, and were produced in great quantities during the war.¹⁰ The French luxury textile firm of Rodier was a major source of innovation in textured fabrics from the 1910s to the 1930s. Rodier’s “kasha,” a pebbly textured cashmere blend introduced in 1914, was durable and resilient but also soft, warm, breathable, and wrinkle resistant. It quickly became an international success, and a staple of the company’s line in the decades that followed.¹¹ Kasha was originally intended for sports clothes, but by the early 1920s it and other rough-textured Rodier fabrics were adapted for winter suits, afternoon and dinner dresses.¹² By the middle of the decade, Rodier was also a recognized leader in the production of woolens and wool-blend fabrics with modernist geometric patterns and novel color effects.¹³

Rodier’s textured and patterned woolens, along with traditional rough-textured, woven wools such as British tweeds, became increasingly popular for tailored dresses, suits, and coats through the late 1920s and into the 1930s. As the cut of women’s garments became more complex, designers worldwide used such textiles to draw attention to the cut and to create subtle visual effects; London designers in the 1930s were particularly skillful in their use of striped and plaid woolens.¹⁴

Garments—Knits, Sportswear, and Silhouette

An important textile turning point for fashion came just at the outset of the war, with the introduction of jersey knit as a high-fashion fabric. Previously, wool and/or cotton jersey had been used primarily for underwear. This fashion innovation is generally credited to French couturier Gabrielle “Coco” Chanel. In 1914, she used wool and silk jerseys, many of them manufactured by Rodier, to create unstructured women’s suits and loose pull-over sweaters, said to be inspired by the sweaters worn by fishermen and male polo players.¹⁵ Chanel’s designs were practical, comfortable and elegant, and well suited to the uncluttered aesthetic of the war years and the growing importance in women’s wardrobes of sports clothing and so-called “spectator” sportswear (Figure 1.1).

By 1917, the name of Chanel was well-known on both sides of the Atlantic, and jersey had become a “classic” fabric for day dresses and tailored garments.¹⁶ Knit fabrics would go on to assume even greater importance in wardrobes over the next century. Chanel’s introduction of a utilitarian, “special purpose” textile into the vocabulary of fashion design also set a pattern that would be repeated by other designers, with other fabrics, in the decades that followed.

In addition to clothing made from knitted yard goods, hand- and machine-knitted sweaters became more widely worn by both men and women during the 1920s and 1930s. Couturier Jean Patou did much to popularize this fashion and was famous for the knit V-neck sweaters, matching cardigans, and bathing suits in bold geometric patterns and stripes he designed beginning in 1924. They were quickly copied, especially in the US, and helped to establish high-fashion knitting as a mass-market industry. Patou was also one of the first to realize the new importance of sports clothes, opening a sportswear boutique called “Le Coin des Sports” in his couture house in 1925.¹⁷ Knitted wool tank swimsuit...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Contents
• List of Illustrations
• Introduction
• 1. Textiles
• 2. Production and Distribution
• 3. The Body
• 4. Belief
• 5. Gender and Sexuality
• 6. Status
• 7. Ethnicity
• 8. Visual Representations
• 9. Literary Representations
• Notes
• Bibliography
• Notes on Contributors
• Index
• eCopyright