Revolutionary Style - The Roaring 20’s

If I was going to live in any decade – it would be the 20’s. I can’t get enough of that flapper mentality – cutting your hair off, throwing away panty hose, and boozing and dancing all night long. It would have been a great time to be young – rather than during the Bush administration and this lovely economic downturn we have going on. We have to play the hand we’re dealt – but that doesn’t mean we can’t live vicariously through Chanel & Paul Poiret and all that they stand for! Luckily – this decade has been resonating in the contemporary market recently, and I’m not exactly sure where it came from – I can’t think of any notable designers who showed anything that would spark this revival, but that almost makes it so much better.

Some key components of the 20’s were the dropped waist, cloche hats – and an overall androgynous silhouette that freed women from corsets and their inhibitions. If you are in the market to see cloche hats in film – Angelina Jolie’s film Changeling is a perfect example. They were actually created because the forehead was considered unfashionable, strange but true. The dropped waist and shift silhouettes came from an extreme turn around in the fashion cycle, going from very tight Victorian corsets to a liberated, I can do anything as well as a man, fashion standpoint. Women actually used to bandage their breasts to make them appear less womanly. I also recently learned from my love’s grandmother that the saying “the bees knees” came from that period – when girls would put blush on their knees because it was considered an errogenous zone – the most anyone had shown at that point were their ankles. Can you imagine? Ok, we are pretty lucky to be young right now.

Forever 21 $34.80