The outbreak of the First World War 1914 saw a watershed in the history of fashion. The radical social changes, instigated by the effects of a world war, inevitably filtered through into the world of fashion.

 

After the First World War women’s clothing was revolutionised. Fashion was liberating; the waistline dropped, and the skirt was abbreviated to suit women’s new found civil and economic rights.

 

Now the corset was no longer essential, clothes paid little attention to the waist and bust, and these fashions were occasionally termed ‘boyish.’

 

However, this exciting and glamorous period in fashion history was relatively short lived; brought to a rapid halt by the Wall Street crash in the early 1930s. From now on clothes became functional and hard wearing.

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