When I was growing up my mother used to horrify me with tales of the evil girdle and longline bras. Yes, a woman wearing these would have a lovely shape, but she’d also be extremely uncomfortable after a few hours. Especially the longline bras with their corset-like boning.
A few times she actually tried to get me to wear something girdle-like, and I protested and ran away. No way would she ever get me in any type of shapewear!
Fast forward to today when I am the proud owner of more than one pair of SPANX. I love my SPANX – dresses look so much better on me with my SPANX. Sexy. Sleek. Ok, so maybe all shapewear isn’t evil.
Now, we all know I am a huge fan of “Mad Men” style. Every time I see Joan Holloway Harris on my television I find myself coveting her dresses. To streamline and authenticate her look, costume designer Janie Bryant outfits her in the girdles and longline bras of the decade. Christina described these bras to Esquire magazine:
“It’s like what’s in a corset — it has these long strips of plastic or metal that keep everything [pauses], you know. Oh, yeah — it’s super comfortable. And then the authentic stockings, with the garters, and then a slip and then our dress. From my girdle and my garters last night, I have two bruises on the top of my legs. From being in it for seventeen hours. Women did that.”
No thank you! I’d rather wear my SPANX – or one of today’s corsets.
Corsets date back to the middle ages (and likely even ancient times) but gained popularity in the 1800s and during the Victorian Age. During the Victorian Age they were worn because of the belief that females were so fragile and frail they needed some sort of stay to hold them up. This resulted in women of all ages, even girls as young as 3 or 4, being tightlaced. The corsets were often laced so tightly that they damaged and/or rearranged internal organs, so that by the time these girls reached their teens they couldn’t sit or stand without the aid of a reinforced corset.
At the same time, the tight-lacing also resulted in difficulty breathing, which led to frequent fainting spells. Some historians even believe that the “fainting couch” was manufactured as a direct result of this phenomena.
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| I bet Betty Draper doesn’t know the history behind her fainting couch. |
In addition to providing a 20-inch waist, a tightly-laced corset also meant a women was virtuous. The tighter a corset, the longer it would take to get her out of her clothes. Moving out of the Victorian Age, the focus moved to shape: the corset was able to provide the highly coveted hourglass figure. Different incarnations of the corset have remained popular through the years for this reason.
According to Wikipedia, “shortly after the start of World War I in 1917, the U.S. War Industries Board asked women to stop buying corsets to free up metal for war production. This step liberated some 28,000 tons of metal, enough to build two battleships.[1] The corset, which had been made using steel stays since the 1860s, further declined in popularity as women took to brassieres and girdles which also used less steel in their construction.”
However, some form of the corset has remained popular since then.
Photographers adore their sensuality (beware, some nudity ahead).
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| Mainbocher Corset. Photograph by Horst P. Horst, 1939. |
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| Black Corset. Photograph by Horst P. Horst, date unknown |
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| Photograph from Ellen Von Unwerth’s ‘Revenge’ Series |
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| Photograph from Ellen Von Unwerth’s ‘Revenge’ Series |
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| Photograph from Ellen Von Unwerth’s ‘Revenge’ Series |
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| Photograph by Jeanloup Sieff |
And some people – like Christina Hendricks – are just born to wear one.
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| Christina Hendricks for GQ UK |
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| Hendricks for GQ UK |
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| Hendricks for NY Magazine |
All images from Google Images unless otherwise noted.
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