New Yorks's Street crash of 1929 introduced a new sobriety into fashion.
A population suffering the trials and tribulations of everyday life found escape at the cinema,and were easily seduced by the Hollywood glamour they saw on the movie screen.
Women no longer appeared androgynous,the waist returned to its rightful place,and hemlines fell to mind-calf.However ,a slighty more masculine silhouette emerged towards the end of the decade as the wasr grew closer,with squared shoulders and narrower hips,which was emphasized by the fashion photography of the day,whereby the model turned her lower half away from the camera but faced it full on with her torso.
Ordinary life required practical daywear as increasing numbers of women entered the marketplace and cultivated a life outside the home.
Fabrics became more practical,too.There was a new interest in the art of pattern cutting.
The waist-hugging dresses in fine wools and crepe de chine now was cleverly,concealed darts and seams,there were intergrated into ruching,cowl necklines and drapped bodices.Hips were defined with shaped seaming and belts became all-important.
Large sculptural buttons,crafted from the new plastics,innovate belt buckles and clevrly constructed collars all added interst to the simplycity of the cut.
Women continued to enjoy aspects of needlework,and although a dressmaker would be employed for making up garments,sewing was considered a suitable occupation for women of all classes.
Costume jewellery was also an important elemnet of the dressed-up look.
Stylized flower baskets and Art Deco inspired Bakelite motifs might adorn the lapel of a tweed suit,or a dramatic large-scale piece might enhance the collar of the dress.
This wardrobe of costume jewellery prompted the popularity of the box bag.
Larger than the 1920s vanity case,the box bag was similarly used to carry cosmetics,but was now freestanding and doubled as both a decorative storage unit on a dressing table or vanity unit,as well as functioning as an evening bag.
Daily use required the bag to have the stalwart qualities of some sort of leather,and usually a zip fastening and chrome fittings with practical,short,over-the-arm handles.
A crocodilian bag would complement fur trimmings,and the pelts of dead mammals were often draped around women's shoulders,with the heads of foxes and ermines holding their own tails between their teeth.
Skins such as snake,crocodile and alligator are known as "exotics" in the handbag trade.
All types of handbags were made from skins,including large,practical,box-shaped bags with double handles and solid brass fittings,and the envelope clutch,which was now squarer in shape with a flap that covered the whole of the front.
Mass production techniques meant that better-quality handbags were more availiable to all,the advice was always to buy the best leather bag you could afford and look on it as an investment.
The design,manufacturing and distribution operation of Richard Koret (1929),produced highquality handbags of understated elegance that were also "fashion aware".
The company's Gazelle logo was appeared on handbags thoughout the twentieth century,including the famous silk clutches carried by First Lady Jackie Kennedy during the Whit House years.
In addition to their own brand handbags,Koret Inc,was a licensee for both Christian Dior and Hubert de Givenchy.
The more functional dressing of 1930s daywear did not apply to evening attire,when th Hollywood effect meant that glamour took centre stgae.
At Paramount studios,the costume designer Travis Banton added to film star Marlene Dietrich's allure with his glorious confections of fur and feathers.
Marlene Dietrich 1935
costume designer Travis Banton
Marlene Dietrich
'Angel'
Blonde Venus
The American designer Gilbert Adrian translated the revolutionary new cutting technique invented by the parisian couturier Madeleine Vionnet onto the cinema screen,in the film Dinner at Eight (1933), Andrian's bias-cut backless dress and ostrich cape for Jean Harlow introduced Parisian couture to the American mass market.Bias cut (across the grain,rather than with the weve of the cloth) allowed the fabric to cling to the body with an unadorned fluidity and a minimum of seaming.Vionnet's aesthetic has influenced pattern cutting to the present day,both the work of the 1960s designer Ossi Clark and the slip dresses of John Galliano are reminders of her craft.
gilbert-adrian-and-norma-shearer
British-born Edward Mainbocher and parisian couturiers Lucienne Lelong,Madeleine Vionnet,Marcel Rochas, Jeanne Lanvin and Molyneaux,all used the opportunity to advertise their products with a discreet monogram embroidered on the flap of the clutch or stamped on the metal clasp of a handbag.
Although times were hard in the 1930s,the evening bag continued to hold a fascination for women,and very few used the same bag from day to night.
Film stars were seen to ritualize the application of make up,and such activities became commonplace off-screen.
Indeed,in contrast to the Edwardian distaste for public "painting",this practice was even perceived as elegant,and handbags began to include mirrors and even lights to facilite puplic repairs to the face.
Evening bags were customarily small,with just enough room for a lipstick and powder compact,as it was assumed that the gentlemen escort would provide the cigarettes and account for any expenses incurred.
Evening bags utilized similar materials to slippery silk and satin crepe de chine dresses then in vogue,which could be dyed to match a particular dress,and often incorporated luxurious details,such as beading.
Evening bags were designed to be held either in the hand or,if a clutch,under the arm.The very wealthy carried bags made of precious metals,all the big jewellery names of the era,Asprey,Cartier and Boucheron produced evening bags that were closely related to jewellery.
Art entered fashion via the society pages of magazines and newspapers which recorded the high jinks of the Surrealist and self-publicist Salvador Dali and his associates.
The flame of Surrealism and the acceptance of the avant-garde in haute couture were fuelled by private views of Dali's work,when models arrived wearing sausage in their hair,and Dali himself appeared in a diving suit.Elsa Schiaparelli (1890-1973) Italian couturier,begun a retutation made with the use of trompe L'oeil (literally,tricking the eye) in her striking knitted garments,such as her "bow" sweaters of 1927.
She launched her first collection in 1929,from her boutiquein the rue de la Paix,Paris.Born in Rome,with a privileged,intellectual backround,Schiaparelli insisted that for her,fashion design was simply a different means of artisticexpression.
The Parisian couturier Christian Dior accused her of creating couture that catered only for painters and poets,and she was certainly at the center of the artistic avant-garde.As the Surrealists succeeded the Dadaists,she collaborated with their most famous exponent,Dali,a painter of exquisitely executed dreamscapes of hypnagogiv imagery.
This connection with her own perhaps for tromp Loeil resulted in a series of witty excursions into bag design that included bags constructed around commonplace objects,such as the piano,the telephone,a Chinese lantern and in 1936,a Birdcage bag reminiscent of Rene Magritte's painting Le Modele Rouge.
In 1934,she pre-empted John Galliano's excursion into especially printed newspaper text with her cotton newsprint bag,bearing press cuttings of herself.It was the first-ever time customized designers fabric,from a distance the bag looked exactly like a folded-up newspaper.
Even practical invented the Lite-on in 1938 again in collaboration with Dali (bag featured two internal light bulbs that backlit a hinged mirror,with a compartment for lipstick,alongside a Dali engraving).
Schiaparelli presented four astonishing collections: the Circus show included performing horses,acrobats,and elephants,the Pagan collection was based on the paintings of the Italian artist Boticelli,and the third show explore the signs of the zodiac.
The idiosyncratic and eclectic approach of Schiaparelli,influenced other handbag designers,syddenly everyone wanted a talking point rather just a handbag.
Elsa Schiaparelli's iconic Bow Sweater from 1927
Elsa Schiaparelli collaboration with Salvador Dalí, 1938.
Schiaparelli-shoe-hat
text
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