Hey guys, I’m Sarah Hansen (soon to be Sarah Tyler in 52 days) and I’m the Production Manager for Shabby Apple. What’s a Production Manager you say? Well, basically, I make all the samples and I order all the fabric and I get everything manufactured. So, if you love a dress from Shabby Apple, you’re welcome. If not, I’m sure it’s somehow not my fault.
So as you can tell, we recently launched our Academia Line for fall this year. Well, just incase you weren’t sure, it’s awesome. The fun part about this line is that we drew inspiration from actual 1950’s patterns for some of the dresses. I’m not sure if you knew this or not, but the 50’s are by FAR the best years for fashion. You might try and argue against this point, but you’d be wrong. Let me explain to you why the 50’s were and still are such an important time for fashion.
So I’m not sure if any of you have heard of Christian Dior… but he’s kind of a big deal. The years before had seen a slow change into less feminine clothing as women went to work during the war. Needless to say, he was not a fan. So he designed a dress that would completely change the feminine ideal. This style was called the “New Look”. I’m sure you’ve seen it, even if you’ve never heard of it. Basically, it was a dress with a tailor fit top and a huge, and I mean HUGE full skirt. He took this thing back to a very Victorian silhouette, which was the epitome of the hour glass figure. Make your waist look tiny, and your hips huge. In some of his more extravagant styles, he used around 100yds of fabric to give his skirt the correct fullness! Take a look at this beauty:
Courtesy of modaspot.com
Anywho, Dior was a visionary and completely changed the way people dressed during that time. The other silhouette that was important was the fitted sheath dress. It was the opposite of this very voluminous style, yet it did the same thing. It let women show off their womanly shapes and be feminine. So, since I think that the hourglass shape is the prefect feminine feature, I love a dress that will show it off or will exaggerate it. Wearing one of the “new look” style dresses feels just like being a fashion sketch. And you know you never feel sexier than when you’ve got on a well tailored little cocktail dress that doesn’t need to show a lot of skin, but simply hugs where it should. Oh and did I mention that the 1950’s are completely responsible for cocktail dresses? Let me just explain Courtesy of worthpoint.com this really quickly. So in the 1950’s women (housewives specifically) would actually change into a fancy dress come 5 o’clock in the evening and greet their husband’s at the door with a cocktail. Then they’d spend an hour being fancy and having some adult beverages. It was a big deal, and women dressed nice for it, as their husbands came home from work wearing suits. So, without the glamorous and extravagant efforts of the 50’s housewife to cater to her husband, we wouldn’t have cocktail dresses (which is also where they got their name from as well). Thanks for everything 1950’s. You’re the best.
Enjoy some fantastic 50’s pics:
Courtesy of artfire.com
Courtesy of kaboodle.com Courtesy of itsallaboutthecolor.blogspot.com
Courtesy of Pattern Mania on Etsy.com
Courtesy of cemetarian.com
Courtesy of stylehive.com Courtesy of Pattern Mania on Etsy.com
This is actually a children’s dress. Amazing. Thanks stylehive.com!
Courtesy of qayscloset.blogspot.com Courtesy of stylehive.com
Courtesy of stylehive.com
Courtesy of goldenhollywoodera.com
Courtesy of Stylehive.com
And the MOST amazing of all,
Christian Dior’s piece from his
fall/winter line ’56-‘57
Courtesy of metmuseum.org
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