#21. Paul Poiret and Orientalism

Hi!  

I had to do a PowerPoint presentation at work on any subject I liked, so I thought it would be a good idea to discuss the subject of the next class. This way, I had a presentation to give AND I turned the PowerPoint into a video for yall!  Magic!

Anyway, the video is below.    And, after that is more stuff to read and maybe some links in case you think it's as cool as I do.   But, in the mean time, let me lead up to the stuff that comes BEFORE my presentation because it's important too.  

Let's go.


SO, we are at the turn of the century, 1900, and society is changing.

There are cars and bicycles and industrialism and women have fought to achieve the legal status of actual PEOPLE instead of property (like a cow or pig.)   Well, since women are now people, they can do people things like own property and get an education and KEEP the money they earn from their jobs instead of being forced to hand it over to whichever male happens to "own" them.   So, awesome!   However, they are also still wearing this:

which is pretty restrictive, right?

Anyway, folks had ideas about this.   As you know, the doctor-type people were saying that corsets were a bad idea, but you already know how well that went over.   Also, artistic types like Gustave Klimt said, "I'll design something pretty for ya!" and did!

And he even painted pretty pictures of people wearing his pretty dresses.

So that's groovy and all but you really can't ride a bike in a billowing caftan.  Weird artists are fun but.... nah.

Which that brings us to our video.  Here is the link to the video in case the video in the box below is too small.  Sometimes it's hard to see the photographs.  Sorry.  :-(

And that's the presentation which got me a new job and a pay raise!  Yay!

But, as you can see, this is sort of simplified for the people who don't necessarily care about fashion.  You, my lovelies, know lots more about fashion so you know that things are never quite that simple.   Therefore, I have a few additional points to make.

1.   I know what I just said but Poiret didn't actually set out to change the world with his designs.  He wanted to have a successful business, yes, but mostly he came up with his ideas because he loved his wife.

Poiret got married to Denise late in life and no one really thought much of her.   She was tall and lean and dark and boyish and exactly not what the going fashion was.

 Poiret adored her.  Pretty much he designed every dress for her and so all of his fashions look amazing on her lean frame.

Even the pretty weird ones.

 It is because of Denise that the "garcon" trend was started.  "Garcon" is the French word for young man, and an athletic tall slender small-busted woman, (like Denise), was soon considered to be very modern, very NOT Victorian, and became the basic template for what a fashionable woman should look like.

Still is now,  too...

Poiret eventually went out of business because he wouldn't update to the new Modern style of fashion.  He continued to design exotic Asian-inspired fashions just for her long after fashion trends had left him far behind.

Which is understandable because this amazing dress (which I LOVE)....

.... Looks absolutely fantastic on Denise.

2.   The transistion from corset to no-corset is super dramatic.

As you can see here.

And it happened VERY rapidly.

If you remember some of the things we have talked about, you might recall that fashion tends to change when culture changes.  The Greeks didn't change their fashion for a hundred years but it wasn't because they weren't capable of it.  They invented atomic theory!   Fashion didn't change because their society didn't change.   Sure, there may have been innovations in dyes or embroider or other forms of ornamentation, but the basic shape, the way they thought a person should look, really didn't change at all.

Now, let's look at the shapes which happened in the years spanning 1906-1920:

1906

1907

1908

1909

1910

1911 (magazine photo shoot)

1912

1913

1914

1920
(Yes, I know I skipped some years there.)

Photo 1908 there is a hobble skirt.   Poiret claimed credit for the very short-lived and extreme fashion.  There is a lot of fuss about how awful it was because women couldn't walk and it's how one restricts horses and stuff.   But, let's take a look at the fashions Poiret was facinated with:

It's hard to run/walk in a tight kimono, too.  Poiret loved this look and I believe it is the true inspiration for the narrow lotus bottom skirt.

Which is fine because it's groovy looking and exactly NOT a giant bustle/petticoate situation.  The question isn't "Why did Poiret bind women??"  A better question is "Why did women wear this stuff?  What about this style drew them?   Why did this change everything?"

Let's take a moment and think about the French Revolution.  Remember that?  Remember what women wore?

"Hi!  Remember me?"

Yeah, the no-corset, high waist look was very Empire.   It was also a time of more equality between everyone, women included.  Men's clothing changed back then, too, to reflect a common ground between all sorts of people and not differences determined by social class.

Modernism, which really got started around the turn of the century, is about these ideas, too.    And women, having things to do, really liked the new look of things.  It was practical and reflected their growing freedom to do fun things like sports!

Once women got started on this new style and idea of clothing, there was no stopping it.   Designers like Madeline Vionnet and Coco Chanel and Elsa Schiaperelli had their own couture houses and started new trends in women's wear.

It did take a while, though.   Extreme and expensive fashion is for the rich folks.

But eventually it trickles down for the working woman to wear, too:

Of course, World War I also helped that along.  But, more on that next time.

#20.1 Menswear

Clarissa requested more information about menswear so here is a quick pictorial summary:

1800- 1815

As you can see it was the basic shape of long trousers, shirt, cravat, waistcoat, and dress coat (what we might call a tail coat) with high collar and large lapels.   The last painting shows a dude in a redingote, which was the French version of the great coat.  The first and third show men who are very probably wearing corsets as well.

1820-1829

Cravats got a lot less puffy and exuberant.  The lapels of the coats calmed down, too, becoming shawl collars.   The dress coats became a lot less cut-away and the sleeves got puffy.  Also, the waist was really emphasized so corseting became more prevalent.

1830's

Cut-away coats were totally not the thing.  It's all frock coats and great coats with tight waistcoats and contrasting cravats.

1840's

So, still frock coats and waistcoats/vests with small collars.  Trousers now have fly fronts instead of drop fronts. (Basically, they look like we wear them now.) Different patterns and colors of cravats/neckcloths are worn and are tied into neat new shapes as demonstrated by Edgar Allen Poe and Alexandre Cabanel above.   Also, Queen Victoria's husband set the trends for the tight waisted corseted look, making it even more extreme and pigeon chested.

Wait.

Oh.  I hate them.

This is from 1848.

This is the idealized shape of men in the late 1840's/early 1850's.   Now look at this idealized shape in the late 1890's (fifty years later) for women.

IT'S THE SAME SHAPE!!!

::Sigh::  How did I miss this?  In an age of bloomers and women riding bicycles and asking to vote, of COURSE they would appropriate a male silhouette from 50 years prior and just add extra feminine /sexy elements to it.  THIS was the reason I was looking for and I wrote the last lecture before I found it.

I'm sorry everyone.  I will amend the previous posting.

Anyway,

1850's

Collars get MUCH shorter on shirts because detachable collars were invented. The precursor to bow ties begins, men wear morning coats for formal stuff in the morning and frock coats for the afternoon and tail coats with white cravats for evening formal occasions.  Thus begins the white-tie-and-tails tradition for men's formal wear which continues to this day.  Also around this time the sack coat is invented which is something that will eventually become the suit coat we know today.  Facial hair also becomes a cool thing.

1860's

More of the same stuff but with the sack coat gaining in popularity.  Frock coats were most common.  Oh, and almost no one wore pants and coat the same color/fabric.  That was weird/fashion forward and called a "ditto suit."  Stovepipe hats and top hats were worn along with whatever other hat you fancied.  Bowlers came out around this time as well, though they tended to be worn by lower classes.  Also Stetson began making hats which quickly became THE hat of the American West.

1870's

Behold, the birth of the lounge suit. (Previously mentioned as a ditto suit.) This is a three-piece suit which has coat, trousers, and vest made from the same fabric, the coat being a sack coat or a modified/shortened frock coat.  The tips of upstanding collars began to be pressed out into "wings" and ties become more like ties men wear today.  Levi Strauss began to make jeans with riveted pockets.  Straw boater hats were worn for outdoor leisure activities.  Also celluloid, the highly flammable plastic which movies are filmed on is turned into collars and cuffs and shirt fronts for daily wear.  They look like this:

They are so stiff that men would bruise their jaws if they turned their heads too quickly at the wrong angle.  Celluloid dickies are the reason this man's shirt rolls up after his collar pops off.  Obviously this cartoon is not from the 1870's but the style remained the same for men's formal wear for 100ish years.

1880's

Though a frock coat was worn for formal occasions, usually the sack coat or ditto suit was worn every day and as often as possible by everyone.  A popular style involved cutting it away so that only the top button could be buttoned.  For running around and doing active stuff the Norfolk jacket happened.

Formal wear, though, didn't remain exclusively formal.  The tuxedo was invented as a casual alternative.  However for big parties the white tie was required.

1890's

By the end of the century men wanted to look lean and cool, with a suit now being a sack coat and a frock coat being formal.  Celluloid collars and cuffs are still attached to shirts and that's the way men looked at the turn of the century.