My Vintage Style: Narrowing It Down

When I started becoming obsessed with vintage clothing I was overwhelmed with a general love for the mid-20th Century. At first the look of any woman from around 1930 to 1960 filled me with excitement. I wanted to rush to my nearest vintage shop and buy something, anything, suitably 'old'. I soon realised that my love was mainly for the 1940s and 1950s. I've always had a thing for the 50s. It started with the music.

The 1950s represents an age when, post war, parts of the world were slowly beginning to get things back together again. Young people finally had discovered 'youth' mostly through this 'crazy' new music, and through new expressions in fashions that were created exclusively for them. Up until then, if you look at clothing for young people, it was almost strictly smaller versions of what their parents had been wearing.

As lovely as they both look, dressing like your mum is never ideal

The 1950s saw the introduction of what I believe one of the most important items of fashion of the 20th Century. The humble pair of jeans. Before the 1950s jeans would have been exclusively worn as work wear. Now, because of something that happened in that decade, jeans are a staple in almost everybodies wardrobe. It was now okay for Teddy Girls to walk around in their tomboy get ups, and for men to abandon their button down shirts and replace them with the t-shirt.

Edwardian retro: Teddy Girls

That's where my vintage fashion obsession started, but it quickly began to move back in time. Growing up, I had always had a fascination with World War II. My dad would take me to the Imperial War Museum and the Cabinet War Rooms, (where I now work) and I was obsessed, obsessed, with Goodnight Sweetheart. I remember thinking that Pheobe was the most beautiful woman ever, and that I wanted to dress up like her. So when I became interested in vintage I started to buy 1940s clothing, practise the hairstyles, and generally, it took over my life as I previously knew it. For me personally, my favourite things to own from that decade, are items that you know can be linked to the war period; like CC41 Utility items, and patriotic prints and accessories.

Dervla Kirwin as Pheobe Bamford in Goodnight Sweetheart

However, after nearly four years, without realising it, I now have a wardrobe full of clothing that fits me well and suits my shape. And as far as my knowledge tells me, it is all mostly from the years between 1947- 1956. I LOVE clothes from earlier in the 1940s, I truly do. But I just don't feel that they suit my body shape as much as the latter 40s and early 50s. I'm small, and the boxier cut of earlier 40s clothing just makes me look, well frankly like a box. I have an hourglass figure shape, but horribly short legs and dreaded 'cankles' (for those of you that aren't familiar with this horrible affliction, it's when your calf and ankle become one, basically leaving you without any ankle to speak of) so benefit from a fuller skirt to make my ankles appear slimmer. Or, the tighter skirts from later in my chosen period also help to elongate my body and accentuate my curves (hopefully detracting attention from my cankles!). Obviously there were women in the 1940s who had the same body shape as me and still looked great, but the difference is, I now have a choice about what era of clothing I wear, and I choose to be vain and pick the exact era that suits me best! That is the beauty of wearing vintage clothing!

I found this wonderful website Fashion Era, on which someone has drawn up the fashion silhouettes from almost every year of the 20th Century. They have some rules about posting images onto websites so you will have to make do with some links for now. This is where the silhouette that I love starts. It's a simple day dress from 1947, but the neck line and shoulders have become rounder and softer, and the skirt is very full, accentuating the waist. Go back just a year earlier and this dress from 1946, although stunning and extremely elegant, has overall, much squarer lines. You can see the accentuated waistline here though, a nod to the New Look, that is just around the corner. So back in 1947 and Dior's extravagant New Look introduces that famous silhouette; full skirt, tiny waist, curvy chest and massive hat!

I have picked a couple of designs from the next few years that I like. This suit from 1949 is not too dissimilar to suits from the early 40s such as this one from 1942, but there is more of an emphasis placed on the shape of the waist, and the overall look is alot more 'grown up' perhaps. The shape of this suit blows me away. Everything about it screams 'I AM WOMAN!' That's one sexy piece of fabric.

So here are a few styles from the later part of this era that I just adore to wear, and that I think suit me the most. The wonderful images are from here.

The thing about fashion is that it's supposed to be fun. It's an expression of who we are, and how we want the rest of the world to see us. The moment you become obsessive about specific dates and getting it so authentically correct in case that idiot at the 40s Weekender points out that your hat is 4 years too early for your shoes, then your kind of missing the point. Yes, I have come to the conclusion after a few years of collecting and wearing vintage that between these dates the clothes that I like most and think suit me best were made. However, if I see a dress from 1943 that I like, and will look nice, then maybe I will buy it, and I won't feel bad about it either.