Did People Wear Vintage in the Golden Era?

[MondoFW]

Does anyone know for sure if there were recurrences of yesteryear's fashion even back in the day? I just can't imagine that people just stuck to what was vogue, even at the time, I imagine there must have been a classic trend like what's happening today.

Pictures would be great.

 

[Upgrade]

There were the Teddy Boys who rebelled and revived Edwardian fashion in the UK in the 50s.

 

[3fingers]

Not that it was it was intentional, but a lot of people didn't give up on a garment because of a bit of wear or because it was out of style. If it was usable, they wore it. Like furniture, few peoples homes looked like the pictures we think of from mid century ads. Pieces were seen from new to things from grandma's youth.
Kind of like my house now.

 

[Stanley Doble]

It wasn't uncommon for men to continue wearing the same style that was fashionable when they were young for the rest of their lives. You can see pictures of older men in the thirties, forties and even early fifties wearing wing collars that were fashionable in 1910.

In some remote or rural areas the same styles persisted for years, as for example the Prince Albert coat that was a fashion of the 1850s but persisted in the south until the 1890s possibly into the early 1900s.

 

[Canadian]

My mother had a great-uncle who wore a navy blue suit every day of his adult life, when he was teaching (he was a professor of languages) through o exploring in the bush with my grandfather. He would buy a suit, then buy an identical suit when that wore out. He would have been born in about 1860, and was still dressing exactly that way when he was in his eighties. So yes, he wore the same style all the time, and from his example, we can assume that other men would dress as they did when they were young, and that people didn't necessarily migrate to modern fashion, they wore what we could call "vintage".

For somebody in my era, (born in the early 80s) we call it vintage. For somebody who was born in say, 1930 (like my grandmother) it was just "clothing". However, my grandfather, born in about 1923 or so, there are family photos of him in a pre-war suit at his wedding, and it was simply a "suit". He never wore a frock coat, but when he was a kid, suits were simply suits, and clothing was simply clothing, so there was no need or financial ability for him and his family to wear the latest threads. And in fact, I suspect the suit from my grandfather's wedding pictures was borrowed from his father, or a family friend, we didn't have any family money from the time. So yeah, he was wearing vintage, but it was simply a situation of a younger man getting married in the late 40s after he came home from the war, and not having a lot of money.

I do suppose that in the GE, we would see people wearing clothing which was at least 40 years old, but it wasn't special or unique, it was simply that they received handmedowns. I don't know of many families which could affford to buy the latest, and most certainly, nobody in my family would toss a perfectly good pair of shoes, a suit, sweater or shirt simply because the rich people were wearing clothing which changed every year.

It strikes me that in the GE, we would have people wearing clothing from say 1910 into the late 40s.

There was an idea called the "jazz suit" I remember hearing about. The jazz suit was a tight suit which I beleive was patterned like a military jacket. It was theorized that soldiers coming home from the war in 1918 would opt for clothing which reminded them of good times in their army uniforms, so they would be glad to spend money for that so that they could go to dances and jazz clubs in the latest threads. That item was a terrible marketing idea and people simply wore what they wore pre-war and basically went home and put on whatever they were wearing prior to the war. It makes sense that a person would only wear what they owned, especially in financially trying times, and the average ex-serviceman could not afford to go buy the "latest" in clothing, furniture, horse carriages (or cars) or even haircuts.

I also have a picture of my grandfather in the 70s wearing a purple suit. I think as the SES and standard of living improved in the western world, people stopped buying clothing because their old stuff had worn out, and instead started buying clothing because it was literally the "newest thing". Probably around the late 1960s, you had people who were going to school, driving their families second car, living in a bachelor pad, etc. As people had more money, and their families were getting smaller, logically people stopped wearing old clothing and instead started wearing the very newest and best.

When my great grandmother moved from the farm to the city, the family asked her how she wanted to decorate her apartment, and what she wanted to bring from the farm. She replied that she wanted to get new stuff, because she had lived with the same stuff for fifty years and had no great desire to live with antiques when they could afford new things.

 

[Bfd70]

Not that it was it was intentional, but a lot of people didn't give up on a garment because of a bit of wear or because it was out of style. If it was usable, they wore it. Like furniture, few peoples homes looked like the pictures we think of from mid century ads. Pieces were seen from new to things from grandma's youth.
Kind of like my house now.

I think this is the most likely scenario. I doubt there was an abundance of say clothes from 1905 available to wear in 1945. I’m guessing they were worn until they disintegrated.

 

[scotrace]

I liked that in the movie Crimson Peak, which is set around 1900, a couple of the characters appear in clothing several decades out of style, even though they were young. It let us know they weren't as prosperous as they made out to be, and that they lived in at least partial isolation.

This is something I've always wondered, also. It's hard to imagine anyone from, say, 1860 wearing 1810 styles intentionally, as a statement. Firstly, the luxury of doing something so avant-guarde would have been non-existent for any but the quite wealthy, who were going to make it their business to keep up with current fashion. Poor immigrants, country folk and the village oddball, maybe.
To be sure, there were preservers, as opposed to collectors. So we have at least a few examples of clothing from earlier centuries because someone had the wherewithal in space and mindfulness to preserve them safely.
I think this is all a very modern thing, intentionally wearing vintage. One, there's so much of it still around. Machine production of clothing and mass retail channels meant that after about 1910, there was a surplus to be appreciated by later generations. And the emerging middle class, especially after WWII, had the spare time and cash to give a rap about collecting anything at all. Also, we are awash in media images in television and film that make those previous eras real to us, accessible, and something romanticized and to be emulated. Until somewhere around 1920, previous styles were preserved in a static memory. You couldn't see and enter those worlds, as we can so easily today.

Summed up brilliantly by John Adams in 1780:
"I must study Politicks and War that my sons may have liberty to study Mathematicks and Philosophy. My sons ought to study Mathematicks and Philosophy, Geography, natural History, Naval Architecture, navigation, Commerce and Agriculture, in order to give their Children a right to study Painting, Poetry, Musick, Architecture, Statuary, Tapestry and Porcelaine."

 

[MondoFW]

What i can gather is that this was rather done involuntarily, perhaps with intent to be less cavalier with money. Watching old movies, i sometimes notice more dated pieces than the setting of the movie being sported.


What did the WW1 generation think of fashion emerging after WW2 (brighter, bolder, more relaxed)?

 

[Edward]

There were the Teddy Boys who rebelled and revived Edwardian fashion in the UK in the 50s.

The original Neo-Edwardians were upper class, mainly young Guards officers (and, reputedly, Gentlemen Who Preferred Gentlemen - a community / subculture often ahead of, or at least leading, the fashion game). After an initial period, it spread to young, working class kids. Interestingly, for a style so British in origin and which pre-dated rock-n-roll, with the arrival of rock and roll which the young Teddy Boys adopted as their own, it became somewhat influenced by Americana, increasing elements of Old West gunfighter style (or at least the Hollywood reinvention thereof) seeping into the look in the form of bootlace ties and brocade waistcoats. The more exaggerated pompadours and sideburns of the seventies revivalists were very much indicative of a later-period Elvis influence.

It wasn't uncommon for men to continue wearing the same style that was fashionable when they were young for the rest of their lives. You can see pictures of older men in the thirties, forties and even early fifties wearing wing collars that were fashionable in 1910.

In exactly the same way as some men of my father's generation were still wearing flared trousers in 1989. Plus ca change...

I liked that in the movie Crimson Peak, which is set around 1900, a couple of the characters appear in clothing several decades out of style, even though they were young. It let us know they weren't as prosperous as they made out to be, and that they lived in at least partial isolation.

This is something I've always wondered, also. It's hard to imagine anyone from, say, 1860 wearing 1810 styles intentionally, as a statement. Firstly, the luxury of doing something so avant-guarde would have been non-existent for any but the quite wealthy, who were going to make it their business to keep up with current fashion. Poor immigrants, country folk and the village oddball, maybe.
To be sure, there were preservers, as opposed to collectors. So we have at least a few examples of clothing from earlier centuries because someone had the wherewithal in space and mindfulness to preserve them safely.
I think this is all a very modern thing, intentionally wearing vintage. One, there's so much of it still around. Machine production of clothing and mass retail channels meant that after about 1910, there was a surplus to be appreciated by later generations. And the emerging middle class, especially after WWII, had the spare time and cash to give a rap about collecting anything at all. Also, we are awash in media images in television and film that make those previous eras real to us, accessible, and something romanticized and to be emulated. Until somewhere around 1920, previous styles were preserved in a static memory. You couldn't see and enter those worlds, as we can so easily today.

Summed up brilliantly by John Adams in 1780:
"I must study Politicks and War that my sons may have liberty to study Mathematicks and Philosophy. My sons ought to study Mathematicks and Philosophy, Geography, natural History, Naval Architecture, navigation, Commerce and Agriculture, in order to give their Children a right to study Painting, Poetry, Musick, Architecture, Statuary, Tapestry and Porcelaine."

The idea of being deliberately 'vintage' is, I agree, to some extent a modern phenomenon. For one thing, it's the increasingly over-casualised nature of our modern society and workplace that allows us to be able to go out and about dressed differently than the norm, largely without hassle (at last in most large urban spaces). This relatively modern idea of being free to dress as we please may hae an upside after all.

Here in the UK, there is also a very strong class element to it. The aristocratic set, more bound up in tradition, have always been more 'vintage'/formal in their clothing choices. Even now at Oxbridge universities you can spot the Upper Class set easily by the way they dress: at their very most casual they'll be wearing a blue blazer with an open neck white shirt, and either khakis or jeans. These are people who grow up going to balls, who hang out in 'jacket and tie, no denims' social clubs and nightclubs, who move in a world that often still hasn't moved on from the post-war era, even if (then as now) that world is continually crumbling. There's been much commentary on how the Cambridges have dressed their first borne in "vintage style", but the fact is they have not - they have simply dressed him in the traditional manner that is still largely common among the aristocracy.