Dior's 'New Look'As cinched waists make
a return we take a look at the King of Cinch
"I
wanted my dresses t be constructed, moulded upon the curves of the
feminine body, whose sweep they would stylize," Christian Dior
proclaimed in his autobiography. This concept was the Paris
designer's aim when, in the spring of 1947, he launched a new line
of women's clothing that stunned and delighted the rest of the
fashionable world.
It was Dior's belief that women were fed-up with the uniforms and
unadorned clothing of WWII. A new lady-like charm was being adopted
by post war women--who were mimicking screen idols such as Grace
Kelly. The New Look took women back to the more simple, traditional
days of their great-grandmothers; Vogue described The New
Look as being "from the era of Madame Bovary…wasp-waisted Gibson
Girl shirtwaists, pleated or tucked…slow-sloped, easy
shoulders…wrapped and bound middles--barrel (almost hobble)
skirts--longer, deeply shaped shadow-box décolleté-padded hips…" And
while Dior's New Look was received with excitement by post-war
women, the Look didn't last past Dior's death in 1957--perhaps
because the design proved impractical for the growing number of
women; however, the look of the 1950s can certainly be looked upon
as a less extreme version of Dior's New Look.
Dior's famous 'Bar' suit
Original sketch for the 'Bar' suit
Once essential ingredient needed for New
Look fashions is a corset-though the fashion magazines of the period
preferred to call them the more exotic term "guepieres."
Dior's own corset (famous for taking inches of the waist) was named
"the waspie;" this new version of the Victorian corset was five or
six inches deep, made of rigid fabric with elastic inserts, and
contained boning and back-lacing. Generally, all corsets of the era
were described by fashion magazines as "super-light weight" and were
advertised as containing feather boning. Such corsets were worn well
cinched at the waist, and were usually worn over a panty- or roll-on
girdle.
In addition to the use of corsets, Dior frequently lined the waists
of his skirts and dresses with feather boning. For women who
could only afford to buy the mass-produced version of The New Look,
Vogue suggested the use of a "waist-liner," which was a strip of
muslin or seam binding with boning sewn into it, which Vogue said
gave "a thin strip of indentation about [the] waist, and could be
sewn into each…dress…"
