The Story of Lingerie. Muriel Barbier
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sufficiently widely cut to support the breasts without crushing them, the armholes should be well-formed; the lining of the fabric should be fine, well-inserted and flexible […] finally, it should follow the lower body and finish on the hips at a firm point of arrival and follow the natural direction of the woman’s side”[3]. Corsetry enhanced the body’s curves and moulded it into new lines. It made the bust round, uplifted, curvaceous or flattened; the waist could be larger or smaller, non-existent or well-defined; hips could seem slimmer or wider. Corsetry dictated the shapes of fashion and often worked against nature. While lingerie revealed a woman’s private world, corsetry was made to create illusion. Corsetry was what made the woman wearing a certain dress fashionable.
The term ‘corsetry’ includes undergarments such as stays, corsets, girdles, waspies, bustiers, farthingales, panniers and crinolines*.
Corsetry was made of internal bones which compress and control the body. These bones were made from sturdy materials such as whalebone, cane, horsehair, steel and elastic fibres. Originally this underwear was meant to be worn over clothes, then over lingerie, so it would be less obvious that it was made out of more sophisticated fabrics than those used for lingerie. Sometimes pieces of corsetry were matched to the clothing or to certain types of lingerie, such as a petticoat.
In this way one can see that corsetry was more fashionable and followed trends because it is visible (in the Middle Ages particularly, corsetry was worn over the dress) and especially because it moulds the figure.
Because of this, corsetry has been criticised to a much greater extent than lingerie. The supporters of corsetry saw in it a symbol of female morality – a woman’s body being maintained and reflecting her upright behaviour. Doctors, hygienists, and later, feminists, have accused designers and manufacturers of wanting to confine the female body inside a structure which is far from natural and that can damage the body. In spite of this criticism, women have accepted and put up with boning since, for them, it was simply a question of fashion: it was a way of disguising figure faults. The female body has long been considered weak, and extra support was considered necessary. 1932 Vogue testified: “Women’s abdominal muscles are notoriously weak and even hard exercise doesn’t keep your figure from spreading if you don’t give it some support”[4].
In fact, corsetry is a woman’s major ally (if she can bear a little suffering) as it allows her to hide any bad points and accentuate her good points! This is the case of Caroline, Honoré de Balzac’s Petites Misères de la vie conjugales (“The Small Miseries of Married Life”), who wears her “most deceptive corset”[5]. Finally, like all lingerie, corsetry carried a significant erotic charge, as it accentuates the most emblematic aspects of the female body.
We would not have covered everything if we failed to mention hosiery here. This third family consists of the manufacture, industry and sale of clothing of knitted fabrics including stockings, socks and certain items of lingerie such as briefs or vests. Hosiery is characterised by the weaving technique which is employed when using materials such as wool, cotton, silk, nylon and today, micro fibre.
Hosiery completes the lingerie-corsetry family and has benefited from great technical advances as a result of improvements in trade and the industrialisation of the sector.
Today, the distinction between lingerie, corsetry and hosiery is rarely made as there is often an overlap between the various different domains (underwired bras, support tights, support briefs). The underwear which we wear today is the result of the development of these three families. Their hygienic, supportive and aesthetic qualities interlink in 21st century underwear.
Combinations. White cotton with Bedfordshire Maltese lace trimming, red sateen corset and steel wire bustle. England, c. 1883–1895, Victoria and Albert Museum, London.
Underwear. Cotton chemise, whalebone corset of blue silk; crinoline spring steel hoop-frame covered with horsehair, with a braided horsehair frill. England and France, c. 1860–1869, Victoria and Albert Museum, London.
Corset by Axfords.
How underwear began to allow the silhouette evolve
Albert Wyndham, The Corset, c. 1925. Silver print, 23.6 × 17.5 cm. Private collection.
François Gérard, Portrait of Juliette Récamier, 1805. Oil on canvas, 225 × 148 cm. Musée Carnavalet, Paris.
Each era develops its own aesthetic idea that replaces the previous one. Underwear plays a fundamental role in creating a fashionable silhouette. Changing shape is based on integral points in clothing: shoulders, waist, bust and hips.
In ancient times, a draped form covered the body and outlined one’s figure. This was the case in Egypt where underwear did not exist and the body was naked under the tunic. Slaves, dancers and musicians were entirely naked, which marked the difference in status between themselves and their masters who wore translucent tunics. Even though an open tradition existed in classical and Hellenistic Greece concerning clothing and draping, the female form was disguised with straps that flattened the bust and hips. The figure was ruled by androgyny[6]. Hellenistic women appeared completely draped and their femininity disappeared under the panels of their robes. Roman civilisation also fought against curves. In an exclusively male world where women had no role, they were forbidden from showing any specific body characteristics. Certain doctors even proposed treatment to prevent the bust developing too much: Dioscoride[7] advised applying powdered Naxos stone to the breasts; Pline[8] suggested scissor-grinder’s mud, and Ovid[9] recommended a poultice of white bread soaked in milk. There is no evidence that these magic potions were effective, but their existence does show a certain disdain for curves and soft shapes as well as a desire to disguise the female form.
In the Middle Ages the figure was slim although the waist was beginning to be defined. During the 14th and 15th centuries it was important to be slender. This was helped by adjusted underwear and, in particular, a surcoat which flattened the breasts, accentuated the curve of the hip and showed off the belly. The end of the Middle Ages was marked by the great Plague epidemics and a round belly and visible belly button were appreciated as a mark of fertility and a sign of promise for a depopulated Europe. The English poet John Gower (1325–1403) mentions this taste for women with a prominent belly in these terms: “Hee seeth hir shape forthwith all / Hir body round, hir middle small.[10]“
The strict confinement obtained with interior boning which compresses and rules the body is in opposition to these supple clothes of olden times is.
European 16th century clothing is marked by a certain uprightness influenced by Spain. The farthingale was a garment which was designed to make skirts more voluminous. It was adopted in England in 1550 and it became all the rage in 1590. In Spain, it did not disappear until 1625. The farthingale gave volume to the hips, accentuated the belly and demarcated the curve of the body. Underneath, women wore bloomers which were sometimes “deceptive” (padded) that shaped thighs and buttocks and increased the volume of skirts. The bust was shaped like a funnel, held rigidly by the basque which compressed the waist and opened up towards the shoulders.
In the 17th century, the female bust regained its round shape and was accentuated by stays up to the top of the torso tightly laced to the waist. Around 1670, the bust lengthened as the stays reached further up the front and the back of the waist. In the 18th century stays were worn very early by young girls and they reached even higher up the back. At the end of the 18th century certain women cheated by reverting to false breasts hidden in their stays.
Felipe
Armand Silvestre,
Women’s abdominal muscles are notoriously weak and even intense exercise does not stop them slackening if they are not supported.
Honoré de Balzac,
All these terms are explained in the glossary.
Cécil de Saint Laurent,
1st century Greek doctor and botanist.
Pline the old (23–79), Roman, naturalist.
Latin poet (43–17).
Il vit tout de suite sa silhouette / Son corps rond, sa taille fine: (“He immediately saw her figure/her round body and small waist”).