Whatever Happened to Twenties Style?

It's been a while since I've written about Twenties style.  Quite frankly, I'm worried about it.  I have always maintained that once a style has been relegated to Halloween costume status, it's gravely endangered. 

Sadly, we've come to remember Twenties fashion as a fringed sheath, long beads, and a headband.  Stir briskly.

Part of the problem, I think, is that the original source material is too distant -- not in time as much as in popular memory.  We remember Thirties fashion primarily through old movies, so many of which are still beloved.  Most Twenties films, however, were silent, and are forgotten.  Many are lost entirely.

How many people remember Colleen Moore, or have ever seen a Clara Bow film?





More recently (though not much) Twenties style was filtered through the Fifties and early Sixties, when there was renewed interest in the period.  They usually got the beads right, but the silhouette wrong.  It would have looked too dated.

The Twenties' female ideal was the boyish figure and the Fifties and early Sixties' ideal was curvy.

Jack Lemmon and Tony Curtis looked more authentically Twenties in Some Like it Hot than Marilyn; androgynous looks were in.



Pattern companies' attempts to revive the Twenties were often unfortunate.

I own some original Twenties patterns myself and I've made one for Cathy.  They can be hard to find and expensive when you do.







The Twenties chemise and dropped waistline is revived on the runways from time to time, true, but why isn't Twenties style more popular?  Is it simply too costume-y for today's tastes?



I recently picked up a fabulous book on Twenties fashion (both male and female), Fashions of the Roaring Twenties, by Ellie Laubner (Schiffer Publishing, Ltd., 1996).



It is full of gorgeous photographs of the wide variety of Twenties fashion, and does a great job establishing the historic context too.  It was a period of tremendous social change for American men and women, and for the latter especially, this was reflected in how they dressed.







More pics of Fashions of the Roaring Twenties and Twenties style here.

Friends, do you consider Twenties style too remote or do you incorporate it in your own style?  (If so, how?)

Is the Twenties just a boop boop de doop on your fashion radar?   Do tell!

PS - A wonderful article on Twenties fashion with some great videos over at Glamour Daze here.

Etsy Obsession for a Sunday Morning

Readers, I am an obsessed Etsy pattern hunter.  There, now you know.


Upon my return from Fire Island I decided to do a comprehensive search under the words "dress pattern,"  recognizing that many patterns end up lost because the seller fails to include important info like  "Vogue Paris Original," or "36 chest," or "size 14" in the title.  All sorts of hidden treasures can be found!

If you search under "dress pattern" you get 33,008 results, however, spread out over 826 pages.  I am currently on page 370.  I have seen SO many dress patterns, friends.  Not only do your eyes begin to permanently cross at a certain point, but you also start to notice how repetitive the styles were.

There are SO many Jackie-O-inspired sheath dresses, SO many double knit pantsuits, SO many demure Forties frocks with geometric stripes.  I find myself wondering if these vintage patterns are still around because they were so popular, or if they have survived uncut because of precisely the opposite reason: nobody wanted to sew them! 

But I did start to notice an interesting trend of which I was formerly unaware.  Twenties style keeps resurfacing but it never quite looks as good as the original.  It reminds me of how in period Twenties movies they (nearly) always get the period wrong, assuming I guess that if they put movie stars in authentic Twenties costumes, makeup, and hair, they'd alienate their then-current-day audiences.

That's Priscilla Lane in "The Roaring Twenties."  Title notwithstanding, those shoulder pads are pure late Thirties.

Remember Natalie Wood in "Splendor in the Grass"?  The necklace looks right, but the soft hair and makeup don't look Twenties to me.

"Thoroughly Modern Millie" -- which I saw in its original run! -- sort of gets it right.  But those eye-popping colors are pure Sixties.

And then there's Barbra in "Funny Girl"with a hairstyle that is just a little too big for the period, not to mention the signature Barbra-Cleopatra eye make up that transcends time.

Twenties-inspired patterns show up again and again on Etsy.  Which one's your favorite?

Fifties?

Sixties?

Seventies?

Eighties?

Or beyond...

Back to an original...the one Cathy modeled a few weeks ago.

From 1929 Dress

And another I have in the pipeline:



OK, I guess you could do this with any period -- big Forties shoulders return in the Eighties, for example, or Thirties (and Forties) nostalgia in the mid-Seventies.

We're definitely in a Mad Men-inspired, early Sixties period now, at least among those who care about such things.  You can get away with just about anything today, don't you think?

Can you think of any former style that never made it back a second time?

Any style that you hope NEVER comes back?  (I mean, really, what IS that coronation look?)

Jump in!

Cathy models the Twenties dress!

The Twenties dress saga is finished at last.

Still a little jet-lagged from her transcontinental flight, Cathy -- a true professional -- gave it her all during our photo shoot yesterday evening.  It's amazing what a cold shower, black coffee, and some nicotine will do to get a model back on her feet!

So sit down and enjoy our latest trip into the past -- a world of flappers and sheiks, Wall Street fortunes and wild parties.   A world on the brink of a financial catastrophe.  A world so very much like our own.



As always, to see these photos full-size, please click on any image and then, in Picasa, choose "View All" in the upper left hand corner, and "Slideshow."

 Enjoy, everybody!

 So, what do you think?  Does Cathy do justice to my poly chiffon?