Fashion has always been a reflection of the times, and it can provide us with a great deal of insight into the history of a period. From the skinny jeans of the 2000s to the bold colors and logos of the mid-2000s real estate boom, fashion has been used to express beliefs, challenge social norms, and even mark different timelines of history. Whether you're researching clothing from a particular era for a book or character, or using clothing styles to help assign a time frame to an old family photograph, fashion can be an invaluable source of information about social and personal history. The Vintage Fashion Guild offers a number of useful resources for identifying clothing and other fashion items, including a chronology of fashion that covers all decades from the 1800s to the 1990s. World War II began immediately after the Great Depression and fashion (or lack thereof) in the first half of the 1940s was significantly impacted by the ongoing war.
This led to a reinvention in how people consumed fashion, as standard sizes were invented and fashion for the masses became popular. In addition to selling vintage clothing, Corsets and Crinolines provides an excellent chronology of fashion with dresses, bodices, skirts, outerwear, shoes, hats, underwear and accessories, with photos. The fashion collection at this London museum is one of the largest and most complete clothing collections in the world. To search for relevant research resources, use search terms such as clothing history, fashion history, fashion design, as well as other terms relevant to your specific query, such as military uniforms, civil war, women's aprons, or a specific location or era. In addition to photos of clothing, accessories, and other fashion garments, this site is packed with informative articles, lesson plans, and research guides related to historic fashion. What people wore, how clothes were made, and who made them can provide important insights into our past. Whether it's due to war, work, social events or everyday life, fashion can clearly establish and show what happened for those garments to exist.
Now more than ever before, fashion is a way for people to express themselves and express the things they believe in.
