Dressing Up For War

From the contents: Laurie KAPLAN: How funny I must look with my breeches pulled down to my knees: nurses' memoirs and autobiographies from the Great war. - Peter BUITENHUIS: The perversion of motherhood: the trope of the son at the front. - Renate PETERS: The metamorphoses of Judith in literature and art: war by other means. - Lorrie GOLDENSOHN: Towards a non-combatant war poetry: Jarrell, Moore, Bishop.

Men in khaki and grey squatting in the trenches, women at work, gender bending in goggles and overalls over their trousers, a girl at the Paris theatre in pleated, beaded silk, a bangle on her forearm made from copper fuse wire from the Somme. What people wear matters. Copiously illustrated, this book is the story of what people on both sides wore on the front line and on the home front through the seismic years of World War I. Nina Edwards, reveals fresh aspects of the war through the prism of the smallest details of personal dress, of clothes, hair and accessories, both in uniform and civilian wear. She explores how, during a period of extraordinary upheaval and rapid change, a particular preference for a type of razor blade or perfume, say, or the just-so adjustment to the tilt of a hat, offer insights into the individual experience of men, women and children during the course of World War I.

Men in khaki and grey squatting in the trenches, women at work, gender bending in goggles and overalls over their trousers, a girl at the Paris theatre in pleated, beaded silk, a bangle on her forearm made from copper fuse wire from the Somme. What people wear matters. Copiously illustrated, this book is the story of what people on both sides wore on the front line and on the home front through the seismic years of World War I. Nina Edwards, reveals fresh aspects of the war through the prism of the smallest details of personal dress, of clothes, hair and accessories, both in uniform and civilian wear. She explores how, during a period of extraordinary upheaval and rapid change, a particular preference for a type of razor blade or perfume, say, or the just-so adjustment to the tilt of a hat, offer insights into the individual experience of men, women and children during the course of World War I.

Featuring many exquisite historical photographs, a celebration of the sometimes extravagant, sometimes bizarre pastime: playing dress-up. Pierrot, Little Bo Peep, cowboy: these characters and many more form part of this colorful story of dressing up, from the accession of Queen Victoria to the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II. During this time, fancy dress became a regular part of people’s social lives, and the craze for it spread across Britain and the Empire, reaching every level of society. Spectacular and witty costumes appeared at suburban street carnivals, victory celebrations, fire festivals, missionary bazaars, and the extravagant balls of the wealthy. From the Victorian middle classes performing “living statues” to squads of Shetland men donning traditional fancy dress and setting fire to a Viking ship at the annual Up Helly Aa celebration, this lavishly illustrated book provides a unique view into the quirky, wonderful world of fancy dress.

An illustrated history of World War II-era women’s fashions, featuring ladies from all nations involved in conflict. What would you wear to war? How would you dress for a winter mission in the open cockpit of a Russian bomber plane? At a fashion show in Occupied Paris? Singing in Harlem, or on fire watch in Tokyo? Women’s Lives and Clothes in WW2 is a unique, illustrated insight into the experiences of women worldwide during World War II and its aftermath. The history of ten tumultuous years is reflected in clothes, fashion, accessories, and uniforms. As housewives, fighters, fashion designers, or spies, women dressed the part when they took up their wartime roles. Attractive to a general reader as well as a specialist, Women’s Lives and Clothes in WW2 focuses on the experiences of British women, then expands to encompass every continent affected by war. Woven through all cultures and countries are common threads of service, survival, resistance, and emotion. Historian Lucy Adlington draws on interviews with wartime women, as well as her own archives and costume collection. Well-known names and famous exploits are featured—alongside many never-before-told stories of quiet heroism. You’ll indulge in luxury fashion, bridal ensembles, and enticing lingerie, as well as thrifty make-do-and-mend. You’ll learn which essential garments to wear when enduring a bomb raid and how a few scraps of clothing will keep you feeling human in a concentration camp. Women's Lives and Clothes in WW2 is richly illustrated throughout, with many previously unpublished photographs, 1940s costumes, and fabulous fashion images. History has never been better dressed.

The loss of a child takes mythological, magical casts--distortions that allow us to see the contours of grief more clearly.

"Aside from the occasional nod to epaulettes or use of camouflage, war and fashion seem to be strange partners. Not so, argue the contributors to this book, who connect military industrial practices as well as military dress to textile and clothing in new ways. For instance, the book includes a series of commentaries on the impact of military dress in the airline industry, in illustrated wartime comics, and even considers today's muscled soldier's body as a new type of uniform. Elsewhere, the effects of conquest introduce a new set of postcolonial aesthetics as military and colonial regimes disrupt local textile production and garment making. In another chapter, it is argued that textiles and fashion are important because they reflect a core practice, one that bridges textile artists and designers in an expressive, creative, and deeply physical way to matters of cultural significance. And the book concludes by calling the very mode of 'military chic' into ethical question. The premier text to illustrate the impact of war on textiles, bodies, costume, art, and design, Fashion & War in Popular Culture will be warmly welcomed by scholars of fashion design and theory, historians of fashion, and those interested in theories of warfare and military science"--Publisher's website.

This is the untold story of our most iconic fashion magazine in its most formative years, in the Second World War. It was an era when wartime exigencies gave its editor, Audrey Withers, the chance to forge an identity for it that went far beyond stylish clothes. In doing so, she set herself against the style and preoccupations of Vogue's mothership in New York, and her often sticky relationship with its formidable editor, Edna Woolman Chase, became a strong dynamic in the Vogue story. But Vogue had a good war, with great writers and top-flight photographers including Lee Miller and Cecil Beaton - who loathed each other - sending images and reports from Europe and much further afield - detailing the plight of the countries and people living amidst war-torn Europe.