Gearing Up

In the early part of the 20th century, many people in both Europe and America became quite fascinated with the Mysterious East. While treatment of those actually from the mysterious east was rather wretched, the both easterners and westerners were happy to borrow superficial details from each other’s culture, and this is well-reflected in late Victorian and Edwardian fashion. Whether you’re actually Asian and want to dress the part or you want to play a proto-otaku, there’s plenty of historical precedent for mixing up western and eastern dress.

The West’s fascination with Asian style is usually traced to the 1909 debut of the Ballets Russes in Paris. From this inspiration, many of the major French designers began incorporating Asian elements into their designs.

Paul Poirot’s designs in particular drew the oriental style into Western fashion. In addition to dresses with Chinese drapes and lines, he also introduced accessories like the Chinese-style parasol and the coolie-inspired hat. His hobble skirt design was also allegedly inspired by the east - it was designed to imitate the tiny, delicate steps of geisha.

Chinese silks were also popular in the creation of Western dresses well into the 1920’s. At the same time, many Asian (particularly Japanese) women were slipping into Western styles, often made with traditional kimono fabrics.

As you can see, both cultures somewhat fetishized the other, creating a fascinating fusion of fashion that could be viewed as a metaphor for the cultural exchange of the time period. It was showy, beautiful, and often superficial on both sides.

Illustration via MIT’s Throwing off Asia exhibit.

This entry was posted on Thursday, June 19th, 2008 at 6:42 pm and is filed under Asian, Clothing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.