This was the “New Look” – a silhouette created by Christian Dior in 1947, with full skirts, wasp-waist and a full bust. At the beginning of the 1950s, the figure lengthened, the breasts were high up, the bust was smaller and a flat stomach was accentuated. Corsetry and padding were necessary. Journalists wrote about the benefits of a healthy diet and exercise as well as good corsetry. In 1950 the bust was oversized following the fashion for “zeppelin” or very full breasts and was obtained by wearing an overstitched bra. The image was popularised by actresses such as Anita Ekberg, Gina Lollobrigida, Sophia Loren, Jane Mansfield, Marilyn Monroe and Jane Russell. Manufacturers such as Marcel Carlier, Carles Krafft, Jessos, Scandale and Star designed underwired corsetry to enhance the “flower woman”.

      In the 1960s the female form followed the changes of the day by being liberated. The fashion was for gamine breasts, narrow hips and extreme slenderness. This glorification of youth was only generalised after 1965 when André Courrèges’ collection showed androgynous shapes and modern woman at ease with her body. Underwear, particularly briefs, followed the line of the body. As a result of the liberation movements of 1968 and Women’s Libbers who burnt their bras, at the end of the 1960s, breasts were emancipated under form-hugging sweaters and Indian tunics: complex underwear sets gave way to almost nothing. The fashion was for leggy, small-breasted women like Jane Birkin or the model Twiggy. After the hippie trend, fashion became more sophisticated and feminine again. There was an obsession with slimming and body-toning to enhance firmness. Gym and aerobics were in vogue. 1980s women exchanged briefs, girdles and corsets for weight-training and hunger. Support came from the inside: women created their own corsets. At the same time breasts became ample and firm. This fashion for a small waist, toned buttocks and ample bust gave a feminine shape that called for underwired bras for those “under endowed by nature”. At the end of the 20th century an ambiguous silhouette began to appear. It was extremely tall and slim, with narrow hips but a generous bust. It can be summed up as a woman who is simultaneously gamine and sensual, an effect which is hard to reproduce and which implies measures from draconian diets to padded bras, if not cosmetic surgery.

      Damart nightie, feminine underwear.

      Wonderbra advertisement.

      From Ancient Greece to modern woman: what have they been wearing under their clothes?

      Chantal Thomass, Catwalk 2004.

      Since the ancient Greek and Roman empires, women have been clad in piles of underwear under their clothes. Many garments were used to shape the body as well as to ward off amorous approaches. So let us undress them!

      Hellenistic Greek women (1st century BC) were hardly naked under their robes. Once a woman’s robe was removed, her body was still draped in a linen tunic. Under this tunic she was wrapped in straps to control her shape: apodesme to support and control the bust, mastodeton which was a narrow red ribbon which encircled the bust for young girls and zona which pulled in and flattened the belly.

      Roman women, in turn, were drowned in their underwear. The first undergarment was the cingulum which held back, a dress panel. Once the dress was held back a garter was displayed above the knee. It was completely useless as Roman women did not wear stockings. Nevertheless it was pretty and this garter, which was sometimes decorated with a jewel, was purely for seductive purposes. Under the dress, women wore a knee-length tunic. Under this tunic the woman’s body was enveloped in the cestus bodice from below the breasts to the groin. Her hips were bound with zona and thus obliterated. Her chest was held in with bands: taenia or facsia for young girls and for women with fuller figures the leather breast-flattening bra was used. The most common garment, however, was the strophium, a scarf which covered the breasts and supported them without crushing them. Some women wore the sublicatum, which was originally designed for acrobats and actresses and which consisted of a sarong with one panel knotted around the waist and the other between the thighs.

      We know there were types of underwear which resembled our present-day briefs and bras, as they are depicted in frescoes and mosaics on Roman villas. The best-known of these is the Sicilian mosaic of the Piazza Armerina (3rd and 4th century). It seems that these pieces of fabric were destined for sports. Nevertheless, these surprising undergarments and the sublicatum marked the end of open clothing. In Rome, the growing popularity of underwear contributed to the removal of shape. At the same time women were removed from the political arena.

      European women in the 15th century

      In 15th century Europe, corsetry was worn outside clothing: the surcoat was a waistcoat laced over the dress, which flattened the breasts and enhanced the belly. Under the dress, mediaeval woman wore a band which pulled the waist in. Her bust was confined in the fustian, a bodice laced behind or on the side. The fustian also included another short bodice, a doublet, made of bands which squeezed the chest, and there was also sometimes an under-bodice made of stiffened linen.

      In the Cluny and Galliera Museums in Paris, one can observe 15th century iron corsets, but they appear to have been designed for women suffering from deformities. All these garments were worn over the “chainse”, the “linen dress” which was the forerunner of the chemise. The chainse was voluminous and wide-sleeved and made out of linen or cotton. Chausses were the forerunner of stockings and were held up by garters which gave them an erotic quality. In the 15th century women were still naked under this underwear. The closed system of underwear began to be generalised in the 16th century.

      Sophoclean

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