How the corset FAKED ITS DEATH : Fashion history murder mystery, or shapewear marketing?
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- Опубліковано 29 вер 2023
- The Victorian corset went out of fashion in the 1920s-- but had fashion killed corsets? Were they in hiding, cleverly disguised as girdles and body shapers? Time for a vintage shapewear murder mystery! Thank you Birch Living for sponsoring! Click here birchliving.com/snappydragon to get 20% off your Birch mattress (plus two free Eco-Rest pillows!). #birchliving
Victorian corsets tortured and restricted women into uncomfortable fashions with tight lacing, until the 1920s when they suddenly went out of use : that's the story we know. But the truth is so much more complex! There were a huge number of reasons fewer women wore corsets from the Edwardian era to the Jazz age, but corsets didn't truly go out of fashion until much later. The reason we think they did is a complicated tangle of underwear marketing history! The old fashioned corset evolved and changed from the S-bend Edwardian corset shape into the more familiar undergarments for women of the 20th century. What's the difference between a boned corset and a body shaper, or a foundation garment, or an abdominal belt support garment? All it really comes down to is fashion marketing.
What is a corset, and what is shapewear? If you think about it, a girdle is really just an underbust corset by a different name! This is how the corset came to be replaced by body shapers and brassieres. The slim, empire waist fashions of the 1910s Titanic era had already made underbust corsets more fashionable than overbust ones, so as the 1920s went on, these underbust corsets took on straighter shapes and different names like garter belt and girdle. Meanwhile, WWI rationing and the underbust corset fashions had encouraged the development of bras, brassieres, and bandeaus for bust support-- the ancestors of the modern bra. These undergarments for women didn't mean corsetry went totally out of fashion, it just changed shape over time. For the boyish, straight lines of 1920s fashion the corset or foundation garment flattened the bust and hips. Into the 1940s and 50s, it developed into the waist cincher shapewear that supported the hourglass New Look 1950s fashions. So is your shapewear bodysuit a modern corset? Maybe! But the 1920s didn't kill the corset; it simply went into hiding. Underwear marketing was determined that corsetry and the corset industry should survive, so the corset changed its name and disguised itself as other foundation garments and types of shapewear.
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I am 78 years old. I remember in my teens having a very glamorous undergarment called a "Merry Widow." It was basically a lightly boned long-line bra/waist cincher/garter belt. I felt just wildly grown-up and sophisticated in it!!!
At 64 I remember it too, however my Mother called it a 'widow maker'! She loved how it made her look but swore it was going to kill her because of how constricted she was!
Both the upsides and downsides of corsetry, right there!
@@SnappyDragon yep, literally! 😆
48 here, I loved my basque (merry widow for the USians, I'm Scots) it was comfy, I could cut about in a pair of jeans or nice trousers and it looked sexy. I didn't use it to keep me contained or in the sense of a corset to achieve restriction - it just fitted perfect.
Now girdles that my mum wore...nah, I'm going to let it all hang out and buy a larger t-shirt.
But isn't that the moral of clothes and corsetry - if it fits properly, you shouldn't have a problem?
@@astrothsknot so true! And part of the fit is how much compression (and where, et c) each person is comfortable with.
When I was shopping for wedding dresses 20+ years ago, I wound up wearing what the dress shop clerk called a "long bra." Truthfully, it was an overbust corset. It was a life saver, though, because the skirt on that dress would have really been uncomfortable otherwise. It took the weight off my waist and distributed it much better. I was even able to do an impromptu polka dance with an uncle and everything stayed in place.
That's one of the things corsets were really useful for in the 19th century! I've tried wearing my 1850s dresses and their giant skirts with and without corsets, and they're much less comfy with no corset because all that weight causes the skirt waistband to dig in.
I'd love to see a dive onto those changes in the 60s and 70s. As you pointed out in this video, people talk a lot about the 20s but I always felt it was the 70s that solidified the way we approach clothes (and hair) now.
Minimal foundation garments, eschewing formalwear almost completely for most people in most social contexts, sportswear as casual wear, free flowing hair with no setting products. It's kind of a shame, really, even though we are way more ''comfortable'' now, how if you don't adhere to these extreme levels of informality you will be overdressed for almost any context (the only thing I fully approve is the complete normalization of pants for women, I cannot live without my bifurcated garments lol).
also the birth of teen fashion! before then teens would transition from children's clothing straight into adult's clothesat some point of maturity
I just might have to! The problem is, as far as aesthetics go I really don't enjoy 60s and 70s fashion so it's been hard to get into. We might finally see if interesting social dynamics win out over visuals for me . . .
@@Anopano3000
Before then, adolescents’ clothes transitioned quite smoothly from children’s styles to adult styles without any notable “detours”.
Yes in the 70s I ditched the girdle completely and my bras had spandex instead of mostly cotton and a small piece of elastic. Your boobs were supposed to move around now. Though I did have some cough lacey corset like garments for play in the bedroom.
For work though I was much less casual, with carefully fitted suits because I had to deal with male executives teaching them to use my software. If I was too casual I got ignored.
@@lenabreijer1311 Wow, you were working with software in the 70s? That's so cool! Also thanks for commenting, I love hearing the experiences from people who were around back then.
And you have a point when it comes to work wear, I agree it is one of the last bastions of true formalwear, alongside things like weddings, even if in some areas people are already wearing very casual clothing as well nowadays. But as someone who was a child in the 2000s I feel people got even more informal these past 20 years (even if underwear changed minimally from the 70s onwards).
I was trying to find a strapless bra for a bridesmaids dress a couple years ago. I’d always had trouble with them falling down so I was trying long line strapless bras. They had long lines of hooks and eyes to close in the back, boning, silicone bands to keep them from slipping, and they were TOTALLY IMPOSSIBLE TO PUT ON BY MYSELF. I couldn’t pull it closed to do the hooks behind myself and if I did them in front and tried to spin the thing around, I couldn’t because the silicone gripped too much to let the tight fitting garment slide around into place.
I found myself wondering why there wasn’t any such thing as a more adjustable, long line, strapless bra that I could actually put on myself and that’s when I remembered corsets exist lol
Our modern styles of corsetry pretending to be “bras” and “shape wear” definitely have their place but I was so annoyed in that dressing room that there wasn’t just something with an “old fashioned” busk and laces! 😂
Oof, so true! I haven't resorted to wearing corsetry under strapless dresses yet, but I just might if I ever need to.
@brigittaalbares3417 - Many women, like actors and models, who wear low-cut strapless or very loose, nearly exposing harness tops, use wide double-stick tape to keep the cloth in contact with their skin.
True, when I read Anne Franks diary, she mentions her mother's corsett slowly falling apart. Funnily enough, at that time, I didn't even find it weird that she had a corsett in the 1940s, even if I thought at that time that corsets are a thing of the 19th century
The terminology change makes it interesting too! If someone says "a 1940s corset" we're surprised, but "a 1940s girdle" is no big deal, even if it's the same object.
@@SnappyDragon True, makes me wonder what they are called in Dutch. Because in my mind I had a picture of a 19th century corsett and I don't remember it being mentioned in any of the adaptations I saw.
My mother was born in 1926 and wore girdles almost all her adult life. I remember asking her in the early 1990s why she still wore them, and she replied that if she didn’t none of her clothes would fit. Only in the last few years of her life did she ditch the girdle.
I can see not wanting to give that up if you've been used to it your whole life!
I remember the adverts for 'Miss Mary's girdles
My dad said his mom wore corsets all her life, up until she died in 1948.
My mother, born in 1939, gave up her girdle in the early 70's with the advent of pantyhose. She no longer needed a girdle to hold up her stockings.
@@oursharon1001 I came across some things in my research saying this was common! Lots of people gave up girdles/garter belts as soon as tights with waists were invented.
My grandmother (who was born in late 1910) always insisted on wearing a “long line bra” - covering bosom to waist and a girdle covering waist to upper thighs. She was a big girl most of her life (I’m very nearly her clone, personality and all). If that doesn’t match what you cover in this vid, I’d eat my hat.
I think it absolutely matches!
Great video! As for the "corset" not being worn through the 1960s and 1970s ... it was still worn by certain women. Older women and plus-size women were still wearing girdles for certain occasions into the 1970s, as evidenced by my old family photographs! Some of those outfits were smoothly fitted over the stomach and hips, and showed every curve, and every time the body jiggled as you moved, which was considered unattractive. The girdles were just a different style, without the suspenders for stockings. In the 1980s, the girdles were augmented with control-top pantyhose, long-line bras, and high-waisted elastic body suits which were meant to do a similar "smoothing" and "support" and "minimizing" function ... and now we have brand-name Spanx, and lingerie lines from the Kardashians, and other similar garments ... some of which I have worn, and found to be more uncomfortable than any corset that I have worn!
Oh absolutely! Even today there are plenty of people who wear shapewear as a rule. I think the shift was more in the default assumption, from "everyone wears shapewear, you don't need a reason" to "you wear shapewear if you have a reason to, and not otherwise".
When my grandmother (on mothers side) passed away, all her clothing where spared (thankfully), she was a very fashionable woman in the 30-ies and 40-ies (and going on all thru her life accually) and boy are there shaping under garments in that "collection" ...I don't really remember my grand mother (she died when I was 5) but my grand father told me that she didn't called her waist shapers anything else than corsets.
I wish I could wear her clothing (my mother have preserved it all accept a wolf skin coat, that was sold many years ago) because it is stylish and beautiful...but she was a petite woman...and well I'm 6 ft tall and muscular ..do the maths.
Super interesting! I'm always appreciative when someone does call those garments "corsets", because it seems to tear down the corset-torture mythos a little. Hard to picture them as Victorian only when it's literally what our grandmothers wore.
I so much prefer all of my stays/corsets to any modern "shapewear". My mom made me wear Spanx to a lot of weddings as a teen and they were uncomfortable, didn't stay in position, and didn't actually give me the "proper lines". I think Spanx are the worst type of under garment
i hate the MYTH of "working women" being a MODERN invention. how many laundresses, cooks, bakers, house cleaners, sewists, poultry sellers, vegetable gardeners etc etc have kept their families fed throughout history? all while wearing SOME adaptation of whatever fashion was current.
my grandma , when she saw me wearing a corset, told me "oh! we used to wear corsets back in the 60s because our stockings weren't elasticated yet and we needed something to hold them up"
I saw lots of things saying that the development of pantyhose contributed to the fall of the corset/girdle, so this makes perfect sense!
Hot grandmas!😂
@@SnappyDragonthat was the only way to wear a mini skirt and be able to sit down without showing your stocking tops!
@@lenabreijer1311 I love this insight. As someone who has only ever worn mini-skirts in a few "adult" settings with the intent of ensuring that stocking tops, and garter straps ARE visible when sitting down... Your perspective is rather enlightening.
The miniskirt and garters for stockings are as equally linked to each other in both scenarios, but for such different ends.
Which, of course makes perfect sense. It wouldn't be an "enticing peek" if it hadn't had the previous taboo of being used to "preserve modesty". But I hadn't actually thought about garters being used with stockings so late. I had thought it was control top one piece panty hose by the mini-skirt era.
Are you aware of a time when stockings were considered more affordable/practical, because you could replace just the one that got a run in it? Was that a thing that you know of?
I've done it. And I've chopped the legs off panty hose, and worn them as stockings with garters. I've bought multiple pairs of the same stockings and mixed and matched to get an intact pair (or fairly evenly distressed pairs where that suits the aesthetic). So it seems like this would have been done by people wearing stockings regularly... depending on price incentives.
@@lynn858 they came about the same time. And of course pantyhose was much more expensive so we coped. Showing your stocking tops was a problem in school and work settings so when I shortened my skirts I was careful to make them not too short and to buy the longest stockings possible. Going without stockings was considered worse then showing the tops.
And yes you bought several packages of the same pairs of nylons so you could swap them out.
In the late 80s and early 90s my mom worked at a bank. Spanx that went from just under the bust to thighs was definitely part of the insane dress code the women had to follow.
That sounds so awful and I wore Spanx only a few times in my life. Imagine wearing this to work everyday! Give me a corset any day over this haha
@@shironerisilk they were also required to wear heels every day, which I guess was even worse.
“Panty-girdles” were still definitely a thing during the 1970s, and elastic “corselettes” (performing the exact same function as the corset) have never been unavailable. And Spanx, of course. Corsets travelling incognito …
Stealth corsetry!
I in my late 60s, so I lived through the "demise" of the girdle (LOL = control top pantyhose anyone?). I can remember that my grandmother wore the long corset with the front steel busk. When you hugged her around the waist it was like hugging a tree trunk LOL. My mom, on the other hand, wore an elastic girdle - high waist and down over the hips. Hugging her had a little more 'give', but not much!!!
That solid feeling is actually one of the more fun things about wearing a corset, to me! It's like armor. If it fits properly, you feel sort of untouchable and solid in your posture and carry yourself more confidently.
I love your channel so much. It's also so funny to me as a goth person when people say corsets 'died'. Bc like. At least 7 out of 10 goth people of all genders have or want to have a corset.
Yeah, they might have gone out of everyday use for most people but are THRIVING in a lot of subcultures!
And a lot have several
@@SnappyDragon My son is a member of a subculture and has a corseted waistcoat which he finds quite comfortable since he, like you, has scoliosis and also kyphosis.
@@oursharon1001 I LOVE corseted waistcoats! A blue-sky sewing skills goal is to learn to make those too one day.
I think that corsetry will never die, it's been with us humans for way too long. There's only one issue for me, that while for example Edwardians padded their corsets to achieve desired silhouette, later it became more about squeezing yourself into some shape and that doesn't seem very comfortable. But if someone is okay with that, why not. It's just my scoliosis and chronic pain thinking 😂 But to be honest, I find corsets quite comfortable, I would never tight lace, but the dispersed pressure seems way better than underwired bra, bras are just painful for me. But I'm just one example and I'm sure there are people who will feel opposite way.
I don't think it'll ever go 100% out of use, although we keep seeing a trend towards less and less structure in Western fashion. First shapewear and underwire bras instead of corsets, then less or more flexible shapewear, then a lot more wireless bras and bralettes . . .
@@SnappyDragon While I also think that now in Western fashion there is more trend for less structure and softer undergarments, I also think that fashion goes in circles and who knows what part of the past will be fashionable in for example 2040. Maybe there will be trend that would need more structure in undergarments?
@@SnappyDragon It annoys me how the trend of less clothing structure plus grafted-on tightness leads to increased pressure to reshape the body itself. I'd rather not spend hours out of every day trying to look like a Photoshopped image. I especially don't want to spend piles of money on a surgically enhanced silhouette that will fall out of style, and then require more surgery to be stylish.
Sometimes I reach for my bra in the morning and just wish it was a day when I could wear my corset because I find it so much more comfortable.
It was a relatively recent buy so my wardrobe is not adapted to it yet. I'm going to have to make some custom pants because I'm not allowed to wear skirts at my uni aside from Fridays...
@@saraquill How much I agree with you! It's kinda ridiculous that we, as a society, are at this point. To be constantly seen as attractive we would have to get surgery once every two years or even more often. Victorians and Edwardians had better idea with the padding. Because why bother changing your body when you can just put a pillow on your butt 😂 I know that they didn't have as advanced surgeries, but they had some cosmetic surgeries back then.
I had to get a long-line bra for wearing beneath my wedding dress fifteen years ago, and did not love it. Despite it having been fitted properly at Nordstrom's, it was uncomfortable and the underwire jabbed me in uncomfortable places due to how my breasts are naturally shaped. I put up with it, but the first thing I did once my spouse and I got home after the wedding was get out of that blasted bra because I couldn't take it anymore. I recently made my second set of stays, however, and while I'm still learning the nuances of fitting for those, it's dramatically more comfortable than that long-line bra ever was.
Regency short stays basically are longline push-up bras! Just, made with different technology.
OoooOOh! I may have to make myself one of those!
On the subject of fashionable silhouettes changing, every time someone says we need to bring back those low-waisted styles of the early 2000s, my first reaction is to hiss and swat at them like a cat. Between my hip-waist ratio and my chubby belly, it's impossible to find low-waisted anything that fits right. If it's not clinging or digging into my hips, it's constantly slipping down or riding up. I've just accepted that certain jeans will never be comfortable for me and every skirt with an elastic waistband will only stay put if i wear it over my belly button. Drop-waist dresses like they wore in the 1920s or exceptionally long shirts are the only way that style would be physically possible to practically maintain, but that early 2000s look was all about bare midrift.
Like i've always been a little countercultural, but i'm not the only one with these fit issues and not all of us have the time or energy to scour the internet for clothes that don't hurt or make our own.
Me too! I like having a variety of options, honeslty, and that's what I struggle with a lot about the idea of a "fashionable silhouette". Like, right now, underwear and swimsuits all have very high-cut legs, which . . . just doesn't work on me. Hence, me spending the summer teaching myself to sew underwear.
It was the same problem in the 60s and 70s. It was really hard to wear those things unless you were thin and shapely with enough curve in the hips to keep them up. And of course you couldn't bend over or your butt crack showed.
My grandmother wore what she referred to as a "roll on corset" until she moved into the old people home. It was a *lot* of elastic panels and strips with plastic boning and no closure that covered from crotch to bra band. I'm guessing she called it that because her mother was born in 1882 and very much called a spade a spade
My mum, in Germany, wore corset-style support garments that encased her from her bust down to her thighs, pretty much until the end of the 20th century (she was born in 1931 and always a little overweight). She never, ever referred to it as a "corset", but in hindsight (having helped her into it a number of times when I was a girl), that's precisely what it was, if made from modern elastic "bra" material xD
P.S. Feel better soon!
. . . I would vastly rather wear one of my corsets than something that went down over my thighs!
@@SnappyDragon These things were soooo restrictive. Ugh. I remember tugging at them to get them down her back when she put one on. She was ashamed of her size and tried to look as slim as possible, but she did say they also provided a lot of support. Still, not something I'd ever wear if you paid me!! I much prefer actual historical corsets too 🥰
My "not-Corset" journey started with a dislocated disk. I couldn't wear a support belt at work (yay food service in the early 90s) my mother suggested a "waist cincher" from the Woman's lingerie section. A highly elasticized waspie with spiral steel boning and three rows of hooks and eyes. It worked well. next was a six year stent with a Rocky Horror Picture Show cast, but I guess that was real corsets and not shapewear. I still make and wear corsets; bras put too much stress on my shoulders.
Once upon a time, in my late teens or early 20s, I found a gorgeous 1920s girdle at a flea market. At this point, I was used to wearing costume corsets and found them comfy enough. Nothing prepared me for the experience of trying to wear a girdle. I have wide hips and a big butt. That thing left deep marks on my thighs, and in my soul. I gave it away to someone who had use for it. Never tried again.
Well, it didn’t fit you since you didn’t know what to buy, so there’s that.
The year is 1963 and my then 12 year old mother was being taken on a shopping trip with her mother for her first girdle. When she put it on she cried out, “Ooo! It pinches!” And her mother just laughed and thought it was the cutest reaction. Something so funny that she then repeated the story to the whole family including to my mother’s horror her uncles. It was the first and only time my mother ever wore a girdle. A fact she is very proud of that it was her generation who threw off the hated thing and never looked back. It’s why I know I can never ask her, my resident sewing expert, for help in sewing any corset like garment.
Did she say "it pitches" or "pinches?" If the former, what was the meaning of the phrase? I'm honestly not meaning to sound as though I am correcting grammar, rather I'm genuinely curious about the use of phrasing as I have never heard it used that way before.
@@greaterthanme876 it means nothing. I’m just a terrible speller even with spellcheck 😓
@@sheleavitt06 I'm so sorry, I really didn't mean to be rude. Thank you for clarifying. I loved the story and thank you so much for sharing it!
@@greaterthanme876 oh no worries. I’m not offended I know I’m a bad speller. I’m glad you enjoyed it.
Terminology is also cyclical. Girdle in the 14th and 15th centuries was an outer item of clothing rather than “underwear” as we know it now.
You could even go as far to call medieval tightlaced doublets a form of corset or corset vest
Possibly, yes! I feel like when you start treating or adding stiffening beyond just layers of fabric, is where you get into corsetry. So my 16th century kirtle that has pad-stitched linen canvas but no boning or glue buckram, would be right on the line.
@@SnappyDragon doublets were Also stiffened by quilting several layers of cloth though mine is a single fabric layer because quilting by hand is quite difficult
I still have my wedding corset from a few decades ago. Steel spiral bones, black silk with gold Chinese dragons from Vollers. The husband is long gone but the corset is still with me. I MAY have a bit of a fetish when it comes to tight lacing but I have always been fascinated by them. For me, living in London during the 90s gave me access to the renaissance of corsetry. I even got to buy one from Ms Velda Lauder herself at a convention. Happy days❤
I've had a few adventures into "shapewear". Control-top knickers (aka spanx) to smooth my tummy (because you absolutely need to have a flat tummy /s). A vintage-style long-line bra and gridle under my wedding dress (I had a full skirt, why did I even bother with the girdle?). I even tried a modern steel boned underbust corset. All leading me to discover that, despite my tummy, I'm not squishy in the right places for these things. I have a short waist, not much gap between my ribcage and my hips, but a long torso! (high-waisted is never high-waisted enough and I find myself adding to the length of the rise of any pants I make)
I totally get this. Like a girdle sounds so old fashion and something my grandmother would wear but it's pretty much Spanx
I just made myself a new concert dress with a boned bodice just for the extra back support while playing violin. I really wish corsets hadn't gone put of style
Note to self : All future corset-testing must involve practicing violin!
@@SnappyDragon it definitely helps keep my back from getting tired while playing. Just finished a concert and I feel much better than usual! As long as the corset doesn't restrict shoulder movement, it's great
This was very interesting. When your cold is gone, I hope you will consider diving into the 60's and 70's with regard to corsetry. As an early teen in the mid-60's, I had a bit of a tussle with my mom about wearing the elasticized girdle. Fortunately, pantyhose made the last defense for those girdles, that they could hold up stockings, irrelevant.
When I was a young child in the sixties, my mother and all my aunts and adult cousins wore long line bras and girdles. It was in fact, a corset cut in half. Disappeared before the mid seventies. I have to say, those shapewear garments made Mom and the Aunts look very sharp.
I'm 39 and I've worn a couple of vintage long bras over the years. The first was a probably late '50s or early '60s "Merry Widow" that was given to my mother by a friend of the family. It never quite fit her correctly, but fit me perfectly in high-school when I started wearing vintage 50s dresses. It was also my first experience with a strapless bra, and I've been disapointed by every modern strapless bra since. They don't stay put. That Merry Widow never slipped, never pinched, and never needed garment tape. Several years later I found a waist length bra with straps of unknown age in a thrift store. My best guess is also late '50s or early '60s, but I really don't know. Comfyest bra ever, although not the easiest to put on. Again, just enough boning to mantain shape, long enough on the torso to stay put, enough elasticity to have full range of movement. The straps keep the cups in place, but don't dig, because the support is distributed all the way down my torso to about an inch or so below my waist (skirt waistbands sit on top of the bra). Why don't they make these anymore!? It's absolutely fabulous for those of us large busted ladies.
My great grandmother (who was 19 in 1914) wore a girdle under all her “good clothes”. Basically whenever she went out she put some shaping underwear. My father remembers how she always sat very upright in church, and muttered about how much the young people slouched.
Coming to the realization that the shapewear I wore under my prom dress was basically a corset lol
Quite possibly! I think my one prom dress that I didn't make myself had some corsetry built into the bodice.
@@SnappyDragon - From what I understand, there are many couture gowns fabricated that way.
Imagine how much more comfortable modern shapewear would be if they added the boning back in. The most common complaint you see about it is it rolling up, which would be entirely solved by a bit of carefully located plastic boning. Longline bras (which are shaped exactly like recency short stays, but in modern materials) and basques have the boning, so I don't see why the ones that come down over the hips don't
When I first started learning about historic modes of dress (within the past five years) I was struck by the similarities between historic stays and corsets and my mother's girdle in the early 1960s. I remember her girdles had suspenders for her pantyhose, and how the girdle shaped her body. You have just confirmed that she was wearing a type of corset, with updated materials and a somewhat different silhouette, but basically the same kind of garment.
I have only ever worn spanx once and I ~haaated~ it so much. I did manage to come across a waist cincher/garterbelt that I liked enough, but after wearing it over a camisole for a while it was so much more comfortable than the spandex nightmare even in Arizona weather lol. I still have it now, and I use it often while I'm working on my current "proper" corset project.
I haven't worn anything like Spanx (I'm tiny, there's not much for them to compress!), but I might have to try it just to compare for comfort. I suspect I would also prefer the structure of a corset, and the extra layer underneath.
It's not the plague, I checked! 😂😂😂
Both hilarious and a very handy option to have had in times of the actual plague... 😂😅
Honestly as someone with joint issues, the straightline corsets have been a blessing to wear as the compression they gave is more than welcomed. The problem I run into is seating, as cars etc are not always made for such ridge sitting (which for my posture is needed) I am already preparing to commission a sport style corset in long line style but I can still do all my farm chores in the 1910s titanic era style corset!
I've only worn an elastic shaper as a corset. It's not something I'd wear often. It would be interesting to know whether I could wear a regular cloth corset with less discomfort.
I have to say, the different figure size images in the Sears catalog seem way more useful than modern size guides!
My grandma was born in the 1920s and wore a girdle and stockings clipped to it until she died just a few years ago. She wasn't dressed without it. She was a plus sized woman and was very uncomfortable in her own skin. As her granddaughter, I hardly wear a bra (haha)
Because no one has invented detachable boobs yet, I'll often wear a binder. I love the flattening effect, but getting into them is a challenge. Too often, the fabric bunches up around the armpits as I put it on. This turns into an extended struggle to pull the binder all the way down.
Compare and contrast my Regency short stays, worn when I don't mind being busty. Still tight, but the lacing makes it much easier to get on and off.
You could try and make a regency binder. ^ ^
I wonder if there's a way to make a binder with lacing
@@sarahblack9333 Why should there not be?
I'm not super knowledgeable about binders, so please correct me if I'm wrong, but as far as I know they are supposed to press the breasts flat against the ribcage.
This is basically what 17th and 18th century stays did too.
Those pushed the breasts upwards too, because of their conical construction, but if you don't want that, you can probably give the garment a different shape to push the breasts downwards or just flat in place.
And if you use a stiffened fabric like they did in the renaissance you can even forgo the boning.
The corset, under that name, survived to at least 1965, when I graduated from McGill University in Montreal. My way to class was past Holt Renfrew, a top-of-the-trees fashion retailer that carried - and may still carry - Paris couture and allied goodies. Right next door, was an unabashed corsetiere. Don't remember the exact name - it was *Something* Corsetiere - that had two modest display windows which always showed partial dummies in laceup corsets in that appalling shade of pink called "flesh". Dunno how long they lasted afterwards - for all I know, they may still be there under a more contemporary name.
A 'long line brassiere' is definitely-not-a-corset, but was certainly required for my formal gown for my Winter Formal for my sophomore year of HS in the early 90's, and did all the same functions. Over-bust, over-hips, boned, not much elastic, multiple rows of hooks and eyes down the back for sizing and fitting and getting in and out of it (and until I was practiced at it, I needed my mom's help--lady's maid, anyone?). I've owned a few over the years, and they're effectively modern corsetry masquerading as shapeware for under formal gowns. My mom got me my first one at a bra-and-swimwear shop that specialized in such things, and especially in bridal undergarments.
Okay, with the definition from the beginning, a piece of clothing 1. made out of a stiffened material, 2. providing bust support and modifying silhouette 3. to achieve a desired outward appearance, does this mean a binder* is a type of corsetry?
*A piece of clothing, usually in a shape of a sleeveless crop top or a tank top, with a stiff panel in the front, used ny transmasculine folks to safely flatten the chest.
I was thinking something similar. I doubt I'm transmasc, but I still really enjoy my binders.
I mean, we still have Spanx & its siblings & cousins. My 1780s & 1810s stays are way more comfortable & don't make going to the bathroom a chore, thanks.
I once wore shapewear-shorts that were supposed to push the stomach in, instead the top rolled down and the entire thing was uncomfortable. The one modern tube-shaped fashion corset I have, may not have enough hipspring but it's so much more comfortable.
wish i had someone nearby or knew how to make corsets myself because i'm sure they'd be way better for my spine and posture since i'm a VERY busty gal
It takes practice, but one can definitely learn!
@@SnappyDragon oh, I’m sure lol. But I’m also a broke bitch 😅
As someone who has so many modern corsets, I'm sitting here thinking, I should probably hide my corsets while I watch this so they don't think that they are actually dead.
My grandmother had a piece of underclothing that was a sleeveless full slip with a padded bust that mainly relied on a compression type fit on the top. The bottom was layered and puffed out slightly. It got to the point where no amount of repair would make it usable again. Preteen me tried to steal it.
I once bought a piece of boned shapewear to smooth out my stomach. It did not work as intended under smooth dresses, since the boning showed, my skin got pinched between the bones of the shapewear and my bra, and ig created an un unfourtunate back boob.
It did however have one amazing quality: I could wear heavy skirts without getting hip pain, or any pain from the waistband becoming to tight during the day.
In persuit of smoothness i later bought a smoothing camisomle, that unfortunatley rolled up to sit right at my waist, not flattering at all.
At a moment of genius, I realized my shapewear thingy was basicly an underbust corset. And the smoothing camisole became a smooth underlayer that prevented any pinching or rubbing. It also smoothed out the back boob. With the right dresses it looked quite nice, and it gave support to heavy skirts. I just had to not eat too much, since I was basicly wearing a tight laced corset.
A number of decades ago, I worked as a nurse's aide in a hospital. One older female patient took a shine to me so much that when she was being discharged, she gave me $5 to buy myself a girdle "to save my back". This was an era when I didn't even wear a bra, only camisoles. ^_^ The nurse I was working with couldn't keep a straight face all through that shift, ribbing me about my "conquest".
I, too, remember the merry widow. In my era, it was vintage fashion. I got mine at a yard sale & the seller said their sister wore it as a "Victorian corset". I wore it as lingerie. (Not very comfy, but, very eyecatching.)
I love how the new corsets/girdles are now called shapewear. I remember getting a slip length shapewear and it was so uncomfortable. Honestly, I think the old stays or corsets would have been more comfortable!
For the most part, they are.
Back in the late 90's, before it was easy to buy online rolls of plastic "whalebone" for historical costuming... my mom took apart one of my grandmother's (her MIL's) old girdles to build some 1830's stays for a friend of ours. Worked just fine, I might add.
I believe that if you accept elastic as a form of "stiffening," corsetry has NEVER gone out of style.
i work in a lingerie store, and while nothing we sell actually functions as shapewear, some items are clearly heavily inspired by corsetry. There are longline bras with a boned triangular section under the band that points down like a stomacher and longline balconette bras that look like they want to be regency short stays. we also have a suspender 'belt' that's a skirt, although it's far too giving to be called a girdle. we still sell chemises too, although they're marketed as nightwear and made from satin polyester, so i wouldn't recommend them
Definitely not a corset shapewear, hmmm. How about the "longline bra" that the sales lady attempted to sell me when bridesmaid dress shopping for my cousin's wedding. It came down to my hips, wsa boned, tucked in my waist a bit, and was reasonably comfortable (synthetic fabric is sweaty and gross, but that hardly counts because the dress was also synthetic), the problem was that this "professional sizing expert" was attempting to shove me into a C-cup, and that hasn't been a realistic expectation since I was in middle school. but in any case, no, totally not a corset, absolutely not a corset.
I would like to see (but I don't know if it exists) a study on regional variation. Here in Italy, for example, although Milan and Florence were among the "capital cities of fashion" in the 20th century, outside the main urban centers old style corsets were very much a thing in the 1930s. A short story by Corrado Alvaro set in that period opens on a group of young shepards carving wooden busks for their future spouses' corsets. And my own granmother (born in 1927, peasant family) proudly wore her "busto" (which was basically a 1910s style corset, as far as I remember) until she was forced out of it at the hospital days before her death (in 2011).
Yes do, we would enjoy a video on the 'health' corsets.
I'm sorry to hear you've had a cold. Feel better! I thought this video was great.
I haven't had too many encounters with corsetry outside of a disastrous attempt at shopping for a bustier in my early twenties. I don't think it helped that I was trying to fit it over a baggy t-shirt at the time and probably had my bust size wrong to boot. (Nowadays I'd want to measure before I go!)
my gran remembers ration coupons ( she was born in 1931) the things she reports her mother gave her car rations( petrol tires etc) to a nabohor in exchange of extra sugar and baking coupons,. they didn't have a car and great grandmother was nurse ( who wouldn't allow her kids to go to the theater on crowded days for fear of polio, great grandmother Helen was a nurse who worked the polio ward, she saw kids just like hers every day at work) who made their bread at home ( from whatever flour they had on hand( not white bread flour which grandmother wished for as a child). In addition grandmother remembers a time before antibiotics and suffered from ear infections in 1939 where she was sent by ferry to a large hospital in Vancouver while her family was DAY OR TWO AWAY BY TRAIN. she reports she was 9 and accompanied by a nurse on the ferry and had surgery while there with ether as the anesthetic used. She was terrified and felt like she was drowning and had a bad reaction to the ether mix. She reports nurses held her nine year old self down while she screamed. It is a vivid memory for her even now. I like to think great grandmother Helen would be an old hand at handling the plague. where they lived tb and polio made the rounds.
When I wa 14 my aunt got me a rubber contraption that closed with hooks and eyes to "train my waist" to thinness. I never got used to it because it was really tight and uncomfortable and her reasoning was really sketchy, but I spent two years on and off trying to wear an ill fitting rubber corset
This was a fascinating video!! Thank you so much for researching and sharing! :D I would be VERY interested in learning about the true death of the corset during the 60s and 70s. Going from "corsets" to bras is such a huge shift that I've never really been able to see how it could have happened.
i remeber talking with my grandmother about corsets once. she was born in the mid '30s and was very poor (just to give you an idea of social class), and she mentioned that she wore corsets when she was young. so this would have been in the '50s and early '60s. since I doubt she was talking about the victorian/edwarian style corsets, I assume she was also using "corset" and a catch-all for the various shapewear that existed
I actually would love a video about the actual "death" of corsets.
Loved this video. Great job on the corset death.😊
I wonder if this makes my reproduction corsets "corset necromancy"
I had a Spanx piece of shapewear and it was painful to wear! The elastic rolled down here and up there and was exceptionally uncomfortable! A non-elastic corset would have stayed in place.
❤ Boy, does this 44DDD wish there was a place I could buy a decent foundational garment that held the girls in place without creating those horrible ridges in my shoulders from the weight. I want cotton, not elastic or lycra, for ease of laundering and comfort. Straps above and support from below to spread the burden more fairly about my skeleton. Apparently I desire too much from mere clothing, and must starve and surgically alter myself to obey fashion rules.😂
My granny wore something called the boyish form.
I saw a lot of similar terms for 1920s corsetry in the magazines and catalogues.
I was born in '81 in the Netherlands and while dressing up was hardly a thing at the market they sold hip to over the bust shapers that were standard old lady wear. They were worn under the not tight flowery dresses and aprons simply to hold up the bust and control the figure. Not to even create a waistline. You'd never guess they were wearing anything much but it was a sort of unspoken understanding that the bigger figure needed extra support that a regular bra and "step in" didn't provide.
The bodyshapers now just have less hooks and eyes, those ladies would never have been able to get into the ones they have now but it did the same thing. Certainly provided much more bust support for a heavy bosom 60 year old lady. Pretty or perky wasn't the goal.
I love listening to your rants! They are so much fun!
I really want to hear about the changes in the 60s & 70s now
This video was very informative and I am so glad you did the research and made it available. I bought a corset for myself and it is so much more comfortable than the bras I’ve been wearing since puberty. I don’t have it to make my tummy smaller but it is nice and supportive and I find I don’t slouch as much when I’m wearing it which means my back doesn’t hurt and I look better standing or sitting up straight.
I remember my grandmother wearing a Nuback girdle that had snaps that held up her hose she called it a foundation garment😮😅
So interesting! I hope you do that next era of corset-murder in an upcoming video :)
Thanks for this neat video!
I have quite a few 20s and 30s french catalogs and they never stop using the word corset haha
"Warner Brother's Corset Company, one of the leading US manufacturers at the time..."
My ears perked up when I heard that name. Any relation to the movie studio?
I'm curious about health corsets - particularly pregnancy corsets. How did they work? Were they comfortable to wear or some sort of gimmick?
I saw some with extra lacing so that it could be adjusted to conform to the belly. I think those corsets just helped keep the belly up, just like those elastic things that women put on nowadays to support the belly.
Corsetry is great for cookie rolling days! It helps support my back so much more than modern day shapewear. It is a modern spin on a Victorian corset that I found at a historical reenactment supply shop.
I was confused that the corset died. I have been wearing steel boned ones since the 90s. Gothic fashion houses like Dark Garden have been making them for a long time!
Awesome video! Havr you any sugestion for simple body shaping/ corsets for men?
Ooh! Ooh! 👋 Now do the Lenberg Bra vs 50s bras!
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I decided a while ago that the spanx-style elasticated control garment is stupid. All it does is compress you into a cylinder (the smallest circumference for the given volume), it doesn't flatten anything. Corsets and stays strike me as more effective in that regard, but I have no ambition to wear clothing that would require such squeezery. I'll be waiting until 'silhouettes' come back in style that aren't actually one's own skin. Long live pajama pants!
Control top pantyhose. Girdle panties -- control top panties. Long line bras. Short long line bras. The underwire. And, of course (drumroll, please) SPANX! (which is just the full body girdle from the 1950s made completely of Lycra and without the obvious extra paneling.)
Also, the 20s fashion was a drastic shift, and was considered quite scandalous. In my history class, we were given 20s photos to examine, and many conservatives didn't adopt the style at all, and stuck to previous decades, with corsets, long hair and floofy skirts. Also, Eastern Europe was not really into fashion since communism and what not, and many XXth century photos show women and girls with long hair and more skin-covering styles, although hats were out. Shorter hairstyles didn't come into fashion for Eastern European women until later. Namely my family photos.
My mother in-law was told when she got married that she now needed a corset so she bought one or two and didn't like them better than her bra so that was the end of that. This would have been in the 60s.
One of the things I've absorbed from 20s and 30s movies and literature could be called the emergence of "cool." I think the boom of the 20s, the way WWI's pointlessness broke faith with church and state, and the boom in media for the masses really glamorized a lifestyle based on experiences, passion, and action, combined with a carefree or slightly detached attitude. Women who weren't "sporty," who were more proper and traditional, were depicted as acceptable, but not fun and cool. Sure, tightly fitted and structured clothing is more restrictive, but a layered, fitted torso combined with full, heavy skirts _looks_ less mobile, less natural, and more involved than a straight silhouette. "Cool" looks comfortable, effortless, and mobile, even when it isn't. Corsets are less restrictive than stiletto heels, but the latter points the toes in a way that visually invites dynamic poses, while the former tends to make all but a few straight torso poses look awkward. "Traditional" boned hourglass corsets even look awkward in simple standing poses when taken at the wrong angle. And "cool" is highly influenced by visual media.
Even if modern corsets are hiding, the mindset of moulding a woman's body into a specific shape is still there and I would say might actually be unhealthier nowadays. Back when everyone padded their hips under their corset, it was understood that their body wasn't really that shape. Nowadays we have people getting dangerous Brazilian butt lifts to achieve that same look by trying to actually alter their body's shape. Wouldn't it just be easier to wear padding? Now, when different body shapes become fashionable (which I think is a gross aspect of fashion) women don't just wear a different style corset, they're pressured to gain and lose weight and hope their body magically turns into that specific shape or get plastic surgery to make it that way. Women starved themselves in the 90s to get that super skinny Britney Spears look and now they're dying on the operating table trying to get that curvy Kardashian body.
This title takes the 🎂. Love it 🥰
It's a bit off topic, but a fun fact.
We all know that foot binding was a brutal fashion trend in China, some will say corsetry was the foot binding in the west (I doubt it.)
Although we are now supposed to leave that terrible history behind, still we wear pointy small shoes with so much padding and high heels, which makes us all have Hallux Valgus by different levels.
Both my grandma and mom had/have hallux valgus. Mom even went to surgery for it.
I thankfully don't show any signs of it yet and I think it's because I prefer wide-toed shoes and also walk barefoot a lot in summer.
Oh, the seventies, you say? My mom (born 1927) felt naked without a girdle and continued to wear them until Spanx came on the market.
shapewear aint going nowhere, baby lol
At least, not unless wearing clothes at all goes out of fashion 🤣
@@SnappyDragon exactly! 😂
So when did the corset go from underwear to outerwear? That would be a fun topic, too.
I would love to see a Snappy Dragon video discussing early 1900s fetish corsetry if you are inclined and can get paid for your efforts.
My grandmother was a teenager and young adult in the 1920's. She said the desired silhouette was flat everywhere. She said she wore a chest binder to flatten her breasts. (And a girdle on the lower half.) Have you found the term binder in your research?
I haven't seen that term, but lots of garments that would do that job! I was focusing mostly on corsets/girdles and less on bras, though, so it may well be out there.
My (trans) kid wears a chest binder. all the time I think. Not that I've actually asked.
My trans friends, do, too. I find it interesting that the same term was used 100 years ago.