20th century fashion 1900- 1919

Film: Titanic
Director: James Cameron
Starring: Kate Winslet and Leonardo DiCaprio.
Release date: November 1, 1997
Set; Atlantic ocean, 1912

20th century fashion 1900-1919

Film: Meet me at St. Louis

Director: Vincente Minnelli
Starring: Judy Garland, Margaret O'Brien, Lucille Bremer, Mary Astor, Tom Drake, Marjorie Main.
Release date: 28 November 1944


Location: St Louis, Missouri, USA
Set in: 1904

20th Century fashion 1900 to 1919

Icon: Irene Castle
Name: Irene Foote
Born: 17th April 1893
          New Rochelle,                   New York
Died: 25 January 1969

• Vernon and Irene Castle were a husband and wife team of ballroom dancers of the early 20th century.
• Irene Castle who popularized the bob in 1914 when she cut her own hair in advance of electivee surgery.
• They also helped to popularize the foxtrot, ragtime, jazz rhythms and African-American music.
• Afterr serving with distinction as a pilot in World War 1, Vernon died in a civilian plane crash in 1918.
• Irene continued to perform and made silent films over the  next decade.
• She remarried, had children and became an animal-rights activist in 1939
• Her life with Vernon was dramatized in The Story of Vernon and Irene Castle.

20th Century fashion 1900-1919

Icon: Edna Purviance


Name: Olga Edna Purviance
Born: 21st October 1895
         Paradise Valley, Nevada
Died:11th January 1958 
         Hollywood, Los Angeles

• Edna was an actress during the silent movie era.
• In eight years she appeared in over thirty films with Charlie Chaplin.
• In 1915 Edna was a plumber in Seaside Heights, New Jersey, while Chaplin was working on his second film with Essanay Studios. He was looking for a leading lady for A Night Out, and one of his associates noticed her at a Tate's Café in San Francisco and thought she should be cast in the role. Chaplin arranged a meeting with her and she got the job.
• Although she was romantically involved with Chaplin for several years, Purviance eventually married John Squore, whom she wed in 1938 and who died in 1945.
• Chaplin kept her on his payroll until she died of cancer in 1958, aged 62.

20th century fashion 1900 to 1919

Other key looks from 1900 to 1919

Edwardian blouses: Made of ruffles or striped, it epiomized the femininity of the time.

S-shape corsets: This corset created the ideal female Edwardian form with a tiny waist.

Geometrics: Sweeping curved patterns in deep colours red, black and blue appeared from 1910 along with other geometric patterns  and cubist motifs.





Hobble and kite dresses: After leaving behind belle époque silhouette, dresses became looser. Paul Poiret created the revolutionary hobble skirt. It had a shorter and narrower hemline which influenced the kite skirt.






Lace up boots:  These came back into fashion during the  years of the first world war.






Beading: Very popular at this time, beading was used excessively on evening dresses






Kimono style: Japanese style dresses were very exotic and brought a new form of beauty based on simplicity and oriental design. Many evening dresses had square cut sleeves and the shape of a kimono.

20th century fashion 1900 - 1919

       Belle Epoque

• The Edwardian era was a time of luxury and indulgence that covered the period from 1890 to 1914 
• It characterised by the Edwardian style. Edwardian fashions were all about status.
• It included a constrictive dress that was enhanced by flounces and ruffles.
•  This silhouette could achieved with the use of a S-shape corset

2Oth century fashion 1900 - 1919

  Overview

   At the start of the century frills and flounces became the fashion. Corsets became less and less popular till in 1909 a new linear silhouette became the fashion as modernism gathered pace. There was an explosion of originality and progressive ideas in art, film and the role of women in society.
  Japanese prints, ancient Greece, ethnic elements and oriental themes all influenced fashion They were shown in exotic style motifs and curvier silhouettes.
   After the First World War fashion changed drastically waist dropped hemlines were raised which enabled flappers to dance the Charleston and the bunny hop. Jazz became widely popular.