How Important Is Fashion History In 2022?
The power of clothing is not a modern notion
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Editor’s Letter, 28/11/2022 by Molly Elizabeth Agnew
According to the Cambridge English Dictionary, history is the study of, or a record of, past events considered together, especially events of a particular period, country, or subject. It is a topic we are taught about from childhood. When we think of historical education we envision classes on the world wars, the Tudors, the USSR and the Romans. Perhaps your school provided knowledge on the Vikings, the Ancient Greeks and our pre-historic ancestors and more. Fashion history, however, is a topic that has often been neglected, both in popular culture and academia and laughed away as ‘unnecessary’ with many choosing to turn their noses up at something seen as ‘feminine’ and ‘vain’. What possible worth could there ever be in studying boring clothes? What is its relevancy?
As I’m sure you can ascertain by the title of this piece, and the fact that I would never be seen writing that fashion has no value, I clearly and wholeheartedly disagree! In her book Understanding Fashion History, Valerie Cumming wrote,
‘Clothing can be viewed as personal property with many successive lives or as a theoretical construct, more abstract than real’.
To summarise, fashion exists in many forms with many connotations and, to me, this is the beauty of its existence. It is complex.
Whether you consider yourself interested in clothing or simply just throw on whatever you see in front of you, it is undeniable that each and every living human has a relationship with fashion, as did every human that came before us. Admittedly, for our cavemen grandparents, their concerns were more about dodging hypothermia than wowing everyone with their edgy styles. Yet, as we developed civilised communities, societies and cultures, fashion too evolved.
Much like architecture, texts and ruins, fashion from years gone by can offer us a wealth of valuable socio-economic, political and religious information because, as previously mentioned, clothing is an integral cog in our societal machine. Fashion has also become more than just clothing, it spreads its influence into the arts and sciences being used as a ribbon to tie myriads of sectors into a neat bow.
By looking at fashions depicted in tapestries and artwork of the high middle ages, (alas, few extant garments remain from this time period for obvious time-related reasons) we can track the influences of the Crusades on culture as they bought back luxurious silks, damasks, velvets and brocades from their, really quite violent, travels. It is in this time period that we really begin to grasp how fashion interacted with class divisions and the progress of this into the early modern period.
Fashions have always been regulated in history, mostly to keep people in tow and remind people of their status and station in society, but also in the context of religion. Sumptuary laws are laws designed to regulate the consumption of a variety of things such as food, furnishing, expenditures and, most commonly, apparel. Some of the earliest examples of what we would consider predecessors of sumptuary laws can be found in Ancient Egypt where the wearing of animal furs was tightly reserved for those in the priesthood.
British monarch Elizabeth I was infamous for her imposition of sumptuary laws with a statute from Elizabeth from 1574 reading,
‘The excess of apparel and the superfluity of unnecessary foreign wares thereto belonging now of late years is grown by sufferance to such an extremity that the manifest decay of the whole realm generally is like to follow’.
Basically, keep up with the fashion trends and wear strictly British. It really was the fashion police making sure you could identify someone’s station because they genuinely believed that the fabric of society would fall apart at the seams otherwise. There are many laws in many countries worldwide today that prohibit the wearing of certain items of clothing for a myriad of reasons, however, religion is generally the common theme. Due to studying fashions of the past, we know that this is sadly not a new phenomenon.
What the Tudors didn’t account for, however, was the rise of the middle class, a class that would gradually blur the lines between ‘peasant’ clothing and aristocratic style which would aid in the cause of rebellion and revolution. As the French revolution took down the monarchy and tore apart its class system at its core, fashions became simpler and less extravagant. After all, you don’t exactly want to be seen in similar fashions to that of Marie Antoinette and her privileged entourage. Fashions during this period differed among European countries depending on their current political situations. The robe à la polonaise first came into style during the 1770s and was reminiscent of other styles worn at that time in France and England. What made the polonaise unique, however, was its skirt which was held up by strings and divided into three draped sections with its name and style said to be derived from Poland’s division by Russia, Prussia and Austria in 1772. Fashion is, and always will remain, inherently political.
We can track the development of new technologies and the rise of industrialization during the 19th century via clothing. In line with new tech and the ever-growing middle classes, 1850s France saw the invention of the department store which would offer fashionable styles to more people, thus expanding freedom of expression at reasonable prices. The first world war saw women thrust into the workforce and as such women’s fashions had no choice but to develop and adapt to fit these new roles which often involved more physical labour. The old Edwardian styles were simply too restrictive and thus tailored suits with less restrictive corsetry and undergarments rose to popularity. The second world war would see a similar shift in women’s clothing for the same reasons as women turned to trousers, slacks and dungarees. Women from the allied countries also began to wear red lipstick during this time period all to spite Hitler who saw any kind of makeup as anti-Aryan. As American culture began to infiltrate London and technology yet again went through a major set of transformations, the 1960s saw hemlines get shorter and fashion became accepted as a form of freedom of expression for one of the first times with punks utilising fashion to bolster their culture.
We can even chart economic health through clothing, specifically skirt lengths with something known as the hemline index theory which posits that skirt lengths rise or fall alongside stock prices, meaning they get longer in periods of economic hardship and shorter in good economic times. The 1920s, 40s and 80s are all great examples of this. Sticking with the 1980s, power dressing rose to almighty prestige as the world grew more stable (makes a change for once), and women found strength in the corporate world. How you dressed made an impact.
These are only a slight handful of examples from Europe, nevertheless, fashion is deeply important globally helping to define every single person and every single culture. Kimonos, sari and tribal prints are just a few examples.
In 2022, fashion history can, as we’ve established above, give us insight into the past, but perhaps its most important aspect in the modern day is its ability to help inform our future. In the foreword for Taschen’s book ‘Fashion History - The Collection Of The Kyoto Costume Institue’, Akiko Fukai superbly sums this up, saying,
“The future transformation of fashion might be glimpsed by achieving an overview of the past history of fashion within its historical context”.
In fact, modern designers regularly reference fashion's past. You could even argue that they don’t really have much of a choice in doing so since every fashion trend is an iteration of an older idea, which is itself an older idea and so on and so forth. Truly nothing is wholly new or unique in fashion! And yet, some designers masterfully utilise historical aspects in their collections with Alexander McQueen and Vivienne Westwood being among the most notable. In their recent Spring 2023 read-to-wear collection, Dior’s Maria Grazia Chirui took inspiration from 16th-century French Queen Catherine de Medici. “The idea was to play with this reference and how much fashion and power are in dialogue”, she said.
So, fashion history is really bloody important and in spite of that, it is not always taken seriously. Why is this? Perhaps it is due to historians tending to focus on trade histories surrounding clothing instead of the actual physical items. Maybe (okay, definitely), it’s because fashion is viewed as innately feminine and womanly which has, in turn, lessened its gravity. This is also the perfect time to briefly mention the fact that men's fashion history is just as fascinating as women’s - seriously, men were the first ones to wear high heels! Of course, fashion has also always had its critics which only emphasise its importance. It gets people talking. It gets people arguing, questioning and changing. It can create real political anger and, hopefully, change, as we are seeing currently in Iran.
Unfortunately, there is a real lack of funding in this sector. The entire premise of the Met Gala, the most anticipated evening in fashion, is to raise money for the Metropolitan Museums costume institute so it can keep running. It has no governmental backing. Fashion history has just been one of those things that people wish to learn more about but haven’t always had access to do so.
Thankfully, things are changing! The rise of historical fashion communities online spearheaded by wonderful creators like Bernadette Banner, Karolina Zebrowska and Vasi Birchwood, has opened up a new way for people to connect and learn online, to discover and educate and long may it continue.
History never repeats, it echoes. Only by understanding our past can we stand a chance at predicting and adjusting our future. We must use every tool at our disposal to do so and, for me at least, that tool is fashion.