Dressing in the Age of Nudity

"The brute covers himself, the rich man and the fop adorn themselves, the elegant man dresses!"

-Honore de Balzac

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Sator
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Wed Feb 27, 2008 2:41 pm

Dressing in the Age of Nudity
- or why are you dressed in your underwear?

Ours is an age in which most people wander around happily dressed in their underwear. It may come as a surprise to you that you might be doing just that right now. However, both shirts and t-shirts were originally considered to be forms of underwear. Yet for many people today they have become acceptable forms of dress. Traditionally, a shirt had to be kept underneath a coat with as little of it showing as possible. That is the origin of the rule about always keeping a coat buttoned up unless one wore a waistcoat underneath. As for t-shirts – they were never meant to be seen. Today, people consider it so normal to be dressed in their underwear that nobody stops to consider that is what they are indeed doing. Even the tie is seen by an increasing number of people as a superfluous item of “over dress” thus removing the last vestige which kept the underwear from being worn on its own. It might seem that this cult of undress – indeed even of nudity – is an affliction unique to our age. Surprisingly, that is far from the case. For history tells us that since the dawn of the modern age of dress with the French Revolution, that ours is the Second Age of Nudity.

The French Revolution precipitated a crisis in dress when extravagant court dress was suddenly villainised as the costume of the “Enemy of the People”.

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Motivated in part by a desire to avoid the guillotine, the upper classes rapidly took to wearing the country dress of the English upper classes, who remained in their country estates, unlike their French aristocracy who congregated around the court of Versailles.

This plate from c.1803 depicts the Frenchman torn between the court dress of the past and Anglomania with its country styled equestrian dress:

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English styled country dress vanquished French styled court dress. Ever since then this process of the villainisation of fine dress has perpetuated itself to the point that the only way to avoid appearing overdressed has become to dress in ones underwear.

What is surprising is that this cult of nudity had its first cyclical appearance after the French Revolution. This was an age when an interest in the humanism of the Classical world represented a means of rebellion against the stuffy conservatism of the modern one. The great rage of Neo-Classicism in the arts involved a celebration of the sensual beauty of the human form. The odalisque by Ingres is a typical example:

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Fashion took its inspiration from the arts in striving for a nude ideal, which brought out the natural beauty of the human form. In women’s fashion it was said, “nakedness dresses woman best”. Women wore thin muslin dresses which even today look like nighties:

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Modern commentators never fail to note how many of the muslin dresses could be worn today with only a little modification; so modern are they in their appearance. It was initially considered scandalous at the time. Even a light shower of rain would result in a “wet t-shirt effect” and all sorts of sensual delights would be revealed for all the world to see. It should be added that women wore virtually no underwear in that period. Fashionable young women were found dead in streets from hypothermia after going to attend balls in the cold of London. Women preferred to risk their lives than be unfashionable.

Men’s dress was hardly any different. Pantaloons were skin-tight and coats were waisted to the very inch of their lives.

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Even coat sleeves were much tighter and narrower than what we are used to today. Above all styles were based around sportswear – pantaloons, riding boots, and coats with cutaway fronts for horse riding were staples of the man’s wardrobe, just as sneakers, polo shirts and baseball caps today. This was indeed the Age of Nudity with its Neo-Classicist delight in showing off the beauty of the human anatomical form.

Everything goes in cycles. The dawn of the Victorian Era ushered in a new age of reactionary conservatism. Frock coats became the main centrepiece of the daytime wardrobe, in severe Victorian black. Moreover, the frock coat had no equestrian or other sporting origin, and soon the riding coat with cutaway front was relegated to the status of the “dress coat” for evening wear, its equestrian origins being quickly forgotten.

It is particularly astonishing how heavily clad women became compared to a generation or two prior:

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With the dawn of the twentieth century a new wave of social change swept in. The lounge suit, originally a form of beach and country resort wear, came to be increasingly commonly worn as city dress.

Even as late as the Edwardian era, conservative fashion plates took pains to always show lounge suits being worn in their 'proper' setting at the beach or country resort:

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However, this picture of Harrods in 1909 shows that they were fighting a losing battle, as gentlemen started to wear their lounge suits into town alongside gentlemen who continued to only wear proper morning dress in town:

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The reaction against the conservatism of the Victorian age resulted in a new casualness, which considered itself adequately dressed in beachwear set the dress tone for the twentieth century. This trend to casualness only became more pronounced as the century progressed. The biggest changes occurred in the 1960s - 70s – the age of student riots and hippies, after which even the lounge suit (beachwear!) started to be regarded increasingly as the monstrous formal dress of the Enemy of the People, as though it were a court suit from the Palace of Versailles. As though to avoid the guillotine one had to dispense even with the beach clothes and strip down to ones underwear. Off went the coat as the shirt and t-shirt were worn openly on their own. As the brick throwing Vietnam war protesters and hippies grew up to become the next generation of portly stockbroker and lawyer they continued the habit of dressing in their underwear, thus blessing the look with a kind of bourgeois respectability.

Modern man has thus been stripped down to his underwear, to live out the nude ideal. We must ask ourselves if the next generation will devise a way of dressing with a greater illusion of nudity than ever before. Or perhaps things will come full circle once more so that the Second Age of Nudity will be supplanted by a new age of conservative reactionary dressiness akin to the Victorian era?
storeynicholas

Wed Feb 27, 2008 3:59 pm

Quasi-nudism has something to do with climate and your climate is pretty fierce. I believe that, in town in England, men still dress reasonably correctly - within legal London, the Square Mile and the West End - certainly if they belong to business, the professions or clubs. I was just observe that, in Brazil hardly anyone hardly wears anything.
NJS
Gruto

Thu Feb 28, 2008 6:22 pm

Excellent stuff, Sator.

I am not sure about the logic thesis/anti-thesis, of display/cover. I think you'll see several kind of dressing in the future connected to different subcultures.
alden
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Thu Feb 28, 2008 6:59 pm

Women preferred to risk their lives than be unfashionable.
Not a lot has changed though now they prefer to risk their husband’s solvency
It is particularly astonishing how heavily clad women became compared to a generation or two prior
It’s probably a good thing they did. If you look at pictures from that day you will see that women, due to a bad diet and zero exercise, attained the size of pocket battleships by their mid twenties. Victoria was the Greenpeace of her time in this regards
Modern man has thus been stripped down to his underwear, to live out the nude ideal.
I knew there had to be a reason why Alex is doing so well with Zimmerli!

Sator, an excellent article. Thanks for putting it together. I always thought ’69 was the end of civilization as we know it, until things started to get even worse.

You summarized in a few slides the evolution from the 17th century preciosite to the 19th century dandy. You might have liked to take this class at Yale.

http://www.yale.edu/ynhti/curriculum/un ... .06.x.html

Cheers

Michael Alden
Costi
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Fri Feb 29, 2008 6:01 pm

alden wrote: You might have liked to take this class at Yale.

http://www.yale.edu/ynhti/curriculum/un ... .06.x.html

Cheers

Michael Alden
How interesting! Here is a memorable excerpt:
“la perfection de la toilette consiste-t-elle dans la simplicite absolue, qui est, en effet, la meilleure maniere de se distinguer”
Charles Baudelaire...
Pangur
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Sun Mar 02, 2008 12:52 pm

For history tells us that since the dawn of the modern age of dress with the French Revolution, that ours is the Second Age of Nudity.
If you go back a little more, you can find the same thing again. At the End of the 15th century the same thing happened. Doublets became shorter, narrower cut and slashed at the arms, so to reveal the shirt underneath. The gap between trousers and doublet was not covered anymore. The front was cut deep, with wide open V-fronts, covered only by elaborate tieing. Not to mention the very suggestive Codpieces!
Women would even walk around with their sleeves off, thus revealing the smock up to the shoulder!. Devil's windows in dresses revealed the waistline.
And then the Renaissance hit Europe with ist mighty force, thus showing more slashes (think of the landsknechts) and a showing of dekolté with the women that was unheard of before!

And the same thing happend to trousers. Beeing underwear in the 5th, they became longer to act as full trousers, and then the Stockings became longer and longer until they took again over as trousers, rendering the linen again to underwear. (and some of the underwear of the 15th century is quite short and tight, even for todays standarts.

Take a look at pictures by Albrecht Dürer, Hohlbein the Elder and Younger, Hieronymus Bosch and read some of the laws, were it is always mentioned, how they have to fine people wo do not dress properly!
RWS
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Sun Mar 02, 2008 5:16 pm

Thank goodness we no longer need to deal with sumptuary laws! Or have they merely taken a different form, with commercial "speech" and social conformity urging us to dress only in certain fashions -- denim pants, decorated undershirts, plastic shoes, and prole caps?
Guille
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Sun Mar 02, 2008 9:35 pm

First of all, I want to thank Sator for this fantastic post. And for initiating such a good topic, too.

Obviously there are movements in history. Epochs are marked by what their movements are in different aspects of civilization (which are divided in two regions: that of society and that of culture). For example, the later decades of the 19th century was an epoch which moved towards: impressionism in painting, starting the road to abstraction; modesty in writers and simplicity in literature (as a reaction to dandies (Balzac) and over-prose; but with the obvious exception, in both aspects, of Oscar Wilde); grandiosity in music (i.e. Wagner's operas, Mahler's symphonies); conservatism in society; a turn from industrialisation to imperialism (Lenin's supposed two steps of capitalism, ignoring the last one, globalization); and formality and restrain (mostly black) in clothing. The movements through the history of a society are marked by previous movements and the events/actions/results of such previous movements.

A strong reaction to a movement may happen if an event which was devastating to many people happened during the epoch of such movement, even if it wasn't caused by that movement (i.e. the reaction against anti-Semitism after WWII and the holocaust, which really wasn't the CAUSE of the war (anti-Semitism), i.e. Nazi Germany didn't want to conquer Europe to kill the Jews there, but to gain Lebensraum, and killing the Jews was a FACTOR of WWII). So, the move against dressiness and formality that exploded in the 60s and has lasted till today, was only a reaction to the Europe that had caused the world wars, the Europe that oppressed women, races, classes… The Europe of the Treaty of Versailles in 1919, of valse balls, of horse riding and racings… Therefore it was a reaction against the elements of clothing of that Europe, of frock coats, top hats, riding breeches, polo coats…

Now, trying to predict what will happen in the future is trying to be Nostradamus, Pascal, or Nietzsche. However if we assess the events that have taken place in these decades, we may be able to come up with something. Of course, within these decades there have been many changes of fashion, and those also had to do with the events that took place (I guess that somehow 1973 Oil Crisis was a significant event in the development of a 70s style and move away from the 60s, although those of you who lived then might know more about this). However, although history moves through movements (logically: movement=change, change=motion, motion=time, time=history, therefore movement=history), this does not mean that history is cyclical. Why will people from the 21st century dress like people from the 19th century? There is nothing that implies that this happens. Most probably, something new altogether will happen, and here is where Gruto comes in.
Gruto wrote: I am not sure about the logic thesis/anti-thesis, of display/cover. I think you'll see several kind of dressing in the future connected to different subcultures.
I agree partly with this. You are right in the basic, that there will be different dressing for different areas of society. After all, there have always been. I think that the suit will be strongly present, but present at a certain level, it will never gain the popularity that it had 30s-70s, as ‘casual business’ (oxymoron) dress is growing since the 80s and will continue growing for sure. Many works won’t require suits in the future. However, there will still be many works that will. It will only become more specialised, more in subcultures, as you say. This specialisation will mean that people who dress in a way will spent more time with people that dress like them, not like today, that you can see people in a same place dressed very differently. There is already some of this specialising, sectionalising in dress in western countries, and I will think it is a current that will increase in the next decades.

I also think that this ‘sectionalisation’ will lead to an overall improvement in the quality of dress (not of clothes themselves, but that will also happen as a by-product: as people dress better they will want better clothes, and hopefully the only textile we will import from China will be quality silk) at each section. Formalwear will still be in a minority, but horrible rental and RTW formalwear will disappear as the people who purchase them won’t be doing so anymore, however the people who will wear formalwear will do so correctly and bespoked, I believe. I also think suits will be more varied and altogether better worn (perhaps plaids will be popular again, although not in the office? Peak lapels, vests, double-breasteds, high waisted trousers, handkerchiefs, non-white shirts, different shirt collars… will become more common, with many other things). Casual wear will also be affected: there are many types of casual wears, therefore it will sectionalize within itself, with people not wearing jeans to play golf, only golfing casual wear… The appropriate casual wear for its corresponding place and occasion.

Perhaps that will be the biggest change as a response to today: nowadays people wear anything anywhere, and you see clothing at places that do not correspond to them. This I believe will change back to when what to wear to places was defined, although not as it was then (wearing morning coats in the morning was in the 19th century, that won’t come back; but morning coats will be worn in the mornings appropriate for them). This is what I think; my prediction. Of course it could have flaws, but I think it seems to be what will happen, specially thinking about what we are expecting to happen in the future (emerging economies, substitution of oil, it will all contribute to ‘sectionalisation’, society in the western countries will move towards the trends described). So, there you have it, ‘sectionalisation’, the word that described the movement of dressing and clothing in the 21st century. Lets hope the events during it are good, so that there is not too much reaction to it later.
Costi
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Sun Mar 02, 2008 11:20 pm

I think the answer to what will happen in the future lies densely concentrated in the motto that accompanies your posts, Guille.
Fashions will continue to come and go. History is sure to repeat its mechanism, in its usual spiral, with respect to the nude/covered binome. Time and taste will sieve unsubstantial whims from genuine style. Elegant dress will continue to update itself, preserving what remains relevant to the times.

Modern times have turned dress from a personal (almost intimate) matter into a market, where the customer is manipulated into buying what factories keep churning out with the endorsement of fashion designers’ prescriptions. Fashion is less a matter of artistic creation today, it is more a matter of innovating with the deliberate purpose of determining the customers to replace their wardrobes at least every couple of years. Mass production needs its debouchees, it doesn’t care what looks good on each individual, only to sell its standardized production in sufficiently large quantities before renewing its recipe and starting all over. This brings along the decline in the quality of materials and techniques employed.
Clothes that are “out of fashion” usually look ridiculous to the same fashion followers that were happy to wear them a few years before. While they deceive themselves that they are refining their style with every new fashion, they don’t realize that they are drifting ever further from true elegance, making it easy for fashion designers to pass on any conceivable idiocy. With the current state (and trend) of industrial development and demographic numbers I think only a large catastrophy could bring us back to the times when EVERY man went to a tailor for his suits, to a shirtmaker for his underwear or to a shoemaker for his shoes. However, even stopping the decline of these trades and keeping the statu quo is a difficult struggle that often makes one feel like Don Quiijote. Which we should take as a compliment - and you first of all, Guille! :wink:
HappyStroller
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Mon Mar 03, 2008 2:22 am

Looking at early forms of the lounge suit, I can't help wondering whether the frock coat rather than the morning coat (cutaway?) played a greater part in its origin.

The morning coat is single-breasted, while the usual frock coat is double-breasted. Many early illustrations show double-breasted lounge suits. Unlike the cutaway morning coat, the bottom front of single-breasted lounge coats look pretty squarish, which is closer in form to single-breasted frock coats.

Is the lounge suit of American or of British origin?
Guille
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Mon Mar 03, 2008 7:47 pm

Costi, I agree with you about fashion. The best prove that it is not about artistic creation anymore is that it lacks the two basic aspects of what ‘art’ is (or at least was): aesthetics and emotion. It is tasteless and lacks emotional value, you do cannot express yourself when you dress in fashion. I didn’t want to claim that we will all go back to the tailors, but I think that ‘sectionalisation’ will lead to an overall improvement in the way people dress, because that is essentially what we do, improve.
HappyStroller wrote:Looking at early forms of the lounge suit, I can't help wondering whether the frock coat rather than the morning coat (cutaway?) played a greater part in its origin.

The morning coat is single-breasted, while the usual frock coat is double-breasted. Many early illustrations show double-breasted lounge suits. Unlike the cutaway morning coat, the bottom front of single-breasted lounge coats look pretty squarish, which is closer in form to single-breasted frock coats.

Is the lounge suit of American or of British origin?
Don’t trust me, Sator and others will have more to say about this, but I think the frock coat was most important in the development of the lounge jacket. I believe that there was a fashion of wearing short frock coats, and that the shortening eventually lead to taking away the waist line of the jacket and making the suit. This is why many ‘sack suits’ were double-breasteds, because the frock coats generally were.
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