Forgive me Father, for I have sinned…
Un Chapitre inedit de l’Histoire du Costume: Le Pantalon Feminin. Pierre Dufay, 1916.
Fun-loving ladies.
Un Chapitre inedit de l’Histoire du Costume: Le Pantalon Feminin. Pierre Dufay, 1916.
Mirror, mirror…
Un Chapitre inedit de l’Histoire du Costume: Le Pantalon Feminin. Pierre Dufay, 1916.
Home From the Soiree
Un Chapitre inedit de l’Histoire du Costume: Le Pantalon Feminin. Pierre Dufay, 1916.
The Burlesque, and The Beau Lost
Un Chapitre inedit de l’Histoire du Costume: Le Pantalon Feminin. Pierre Dufay, 1916.
Getting ready for a night out…
Un Chapitre inedit de l’Histoire du Costume: Le Pantalon Feminin. Pierre Dufay, 1916.
Time with friends…
Un Chapitre inedit de l’Histoire du Costume: Le Pantalon Feminin. Pierre Dufay, 1916.
“Bloomer Club” Cigar Box Cover
An 1890’s satiric lid for a cigar box, featuring women in the just-barely-acceptable new styles of skirtless knickerbockers (Bloomers) at a swanky social club. Of course, late-Victorian gender mores were still very rigid in many aspects of society, especially in formal settings, so this was an absurd satirical proposition.
The acceptable settings for bloomers (at least for the more progressively-minded - many people still felt scandalized by them in general) were not restricted to when one was bicycling. Sports such as basketball were also becoming more acceptable for women, and nonrestrictive clothing was a “must” in those arenas, as well.
Women, wheeling their way to first-wave feminism and suffrage.
“What if the bicycle girl does sit around in comfortable clothing instead of in a long silk skirt and tight corsets. What if she does chew gum and talk slang as long as she reaps enjoyment from it. There is enough misery in the world.”
I like this Dr. Neesen fellow. While most of his book is about general cycling information and instruction, his chapter on “Is the bicycle detrimental to women’s health?” was one of the finer screeds on the benefits of cycling, and on the fact that everyone would benefit if women were allowed to (and encouraged to) develop both their mental and physical strength. He saw the continual discouragement by some groups of men to be completely nonsensical from every angle.
Dr. Neesen’s Book on Wheeling: Hints and Advice to Men and Women from the Physician’s Standpoint. Victor Neesen, M.D., 1899.
“It I will have, or I will have none!”
1897 advertisement for “Elliman’s Universal Embrocation Slough”
Check out those kickin’ bloomers she’s sporting!
