itās hilarious to me when people call historical fashions that men hated oppressive
like in BuzzFeedās Women Wear Hoop Skirts For A Day While Being Exaggeratedly Bad At Doing Everything In Them video, one woman comments that sheās beingĀ āoppressed by the patriarchy.ā if youāve read anything Victorian man ever said about hoop skirts, you know thatās pretty much the exact opposite of the truth
thing is, hoop skirts evolved asĀ liberatingĀ garment for women. before them, to achieve roughly conical skirt fullness, they had to wear many layers of petticoats (some stiffened with horsehair braid or other kinds of cord). the cage crinoline made their outfits instantly lighter and easier to move in
it also enabled skirts to get waaaaay bigger. and, as you see in the late 1860s, 1870s, and mid-late 1880s, to take on even less natural shapes. we jokingly call bustles fake butts, but trust me- nobody saw them that way. it was just skirts doing weird, exciting Skirt Things that women had tons of fun with
men, obviously, loathed the whole affair
(1864)
(1850s. gods, if only crinolines were huge enough to keep men from getting too close)
(no date given, but also, this is 100% impossible)
(also undated, but the ruffles make me think 1850s)
it was also something that women of all social classes- maids and society ladies, enslaved women and free women of color -all wore at one point or another. interesting bit of unexpected equalization there
and when bustles came in, guess what? men hated those, too
(1880s)
(probably also 1880s? the ladies are being compared to beetles and snails. in case that was unclear)
(1870s, I think? the bustle itself looks early 1870s but the tight fit of the actual gown looks later)
hoops and bustles werenāt tools of the patriarchy. they were items 1 and 2 on the 19th centuryāsĀ āFashion Trends Women Love That Men Hateā lists, with bonus built-in personal space enforcement
Gonna add something as someone whoās worn a lot of period stuff for theatre:
The reason you suck at doing things in a hoop skirt is because youāre not used to doing things in a hoop skirt.
The first time I got in a Colonial-aristocracy dress I felt like I couldnāt breathe. The construction didnāt actually allow me to raise my arms all the way over my head (yes, thatās period-accurate). We had one dresser to every two women, because the only things we could put on ourselves were our tights, shifts, and first crinoline. Someone else had to lace our corsets, slip on our extra crinolines, hold our arms to balance us while a second person actually put the dresses on us like we were dolls, and do up our shoesāwhich we could not put on ourselves because we needed to be able to balance when the dress went on. My entire costume was almost 40 pounds (I should mention here that many of the dresses were made entirely of upholstery fabric), and I actually did not have the biggest dress in the show.
We wore our costumes for two weeks of rehearsal, which is quite a lot in university theatre. The first night we were all in dress, most of the ladies went propless because we were holding up our skirts to try and get a feel for both balance and where our feet were in comparison to where it looked like they should be. I actually fell off the stage.
By opening night? We were square-dancing in the damn things. We had one scene where our leading man needed to whistle, but he didnāt know how and I was the only one in the cast loud enough to be heard whistling from under the stage, so I was also commando-crawling underneath him at full speed trying to match his stage positionāwhile still in the dress. And petticoats. And corset. Someone took my shoes off for that scene so I could use my toes to propel myself and I laid on a sheet so I wouldnāt get the dress dirty, but that was itāI was going full Solid Snake in a space about 18ā³ high, wearing a dress that covered me from collarbones to floor and weighed as much as a five-year-old child. And it worked beautifully.
These women knew how to wear these clothes. Itās a lot less ārestrictiveā when itās old hat.
I have worn hoop skirts a lot, especially in summer. I still wear hoop skirts if Iām going to be at an event where I will probably be under stage lights. (For example, Vampire Ball.)
I can ride public transportation while wearing them. I can take a taxi while wearing them. I can go on rides at Disneyland while wearing them. Because Iāve practiced wearing them and twisting the rigid-but-flexible skirt bones so I can sit on them and not buffet other people with my skirts.Ā
Hoop skirts are awesome.
Hoop skirts are also air conditioning.Ā If you ever go to reenactments in the South, particularly in summer, youāll notice a lot of ladies gently swaying in their big 1860s skirts ā because it fans all the sweaty bits.Ā Youāll be much cooler in a polished cotton gown with full sleeves, ruffles, and hoopskirt than in a riding jacket and trousers, let me promise you!Ā (This is part of the reason many enslaved women also enthusiastically preferred larger skirts ā they had more to do than sit in the shade, but theyād get a bit of a breeze from the hoopsā movement as they were walking.)Ā Ā
Theyāre also ā and I canāt emphasize enough how important this is ā really easy to pee in.Ā If youāre in split-crotch drawers (which, until at least the 1890s, you were), you can take an easy promenade a few feet away from the gents and then squat down and pee in pretty much total privacy.Ā It gives so much freedom in travel when itās not a problem to pee most anywhere.
People also donāt realize that corsets themselves were a HUGE HUGE IMPROVEMENT over previous support-garment styles ā and if you have large breasts that donāt naturally float freely above your ribcage (which some peopleās do! but itās not that common), corsets are often an improvement over modern bras.
They hold up the breasts from underneath, taking the weight of them off your back.Ā Most historical corset styles donāt have shoulder straps, so youāre not bearing the weight of your breast there, either, and you can raise your arms as far as your dressās shoulder line allows (which is the actually restrictive bit ā in my 1830s dress, literally all I can do is work in my lap, but in my 1890s dress I can paddle a kayak or draw a longbow with no trouble.Ā Both in a full corset).Ā They support your back and reduce the physical effort it takes to not slouch, helping avoid back pain.Ā Theyāre rigid enough that you donāt usually have to adjust your clothing to keep it where it belongs.Ā Theyāre flexible ā if youāre having a bloaty PMS day you just ā¦ donāt lace it as tightly, and if your back muscles are sore you can lace it a little tighter.Ā And you can undo a cup (or, yāknow, not have breast cups) to nurse a baby without losing any of the structural integrity of the garment.
I do educational/historical dressing and people are really insistent, like,Ā āThe corset was invented by a man, wasnāt it?āĀ Ā āActually, women were at the forefront of changing undergarment styles throughout the 19th century!āĀ āBut itās true that it was invented by a man.āĀ Ā
Uh, well, itās hard to say whoĀ āinventedā the style but itās very likely that womenās dressmakers mostly innovated womenās corsets and menās tailors mostly innovated menās corsets, honey.Ā Because those exist too.
Everything about all of this is accurate.
@star-anise
Yeees.
Also? These fashions are about taking up space. Theyāre about being loud and visible and saying HERE I AM. About sayingĀ āIām so rich, I need someone to help me dress every morning.ā And about saying,Ā āI am not solely here for male consumptionāāthereās a reason so many cartoons lampooning womenās fashion are about how hard those ladies are to kiss, and how impossible itād be to have a quick fuck in them. (Which it actually isnāt, but thatās beside the point)
Historical womenās fashions arenāt 100% unproblematic and absolutely wonderful. They make stark class distinctions incredibly visible, because you simply cannotĀ wear some of these dresses and keep them maintained without a private staff to do a ton of work for you. They upheld a standard of femininity a lot of women were excluded from. They limited womenās and girlsā participation in sports and athletics.Ā
But damn, women wore them for a reason.
