Village Ladies 1

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They all had such wonderful, risque fun that the fields soon echoed with their laughter, and I always saw the men having as much knickers-gawping as they dared! It's a cultural treasure full of vintage lingerie, vintage burlesque, and some awesome hair and makeup. There were silky rayon knickers, stretch-nylon, and many unusual knicker-materials too numerous to list here.

Vintage-inspired, authentic vintage, vintage catalogs…taking a past look at women's undergarments is interesting not only from a fashion perspective, but also from a social or cultural one.Christian Dior's famous 'New Look' required the sort of structured underpinnings that hadn't been seen since The Edwardian Era. When I was young, many mature-aged women far out here in the country were only too eager to undress to their knickers, as I mentioned for the picture above.

The traditional silhouette of long-line bras with French Knickers really does conjure up a 1940s ideal of glamour and sexuality with an over-riding elegance, and there are many “pin-up” images of models and starlets of the day posing in this kind of lingerie, a look that modern-day vintage style pin-up girls also aspire to. This was the heyday of French Knickers and Camiknickers, made in silk or rayon and beautifully shaped, with little side button fastenings at the waist, always with the wide legs and often decorated with embroidery and lace trim. By the 1920s, skirts had shortened to the knee, the body shape to aspire to was boy-like with no curves and fabric had become sheerer so lingerie styles progressed accordingly which is where our ‘French Knickers’ style comes in, alongside Camiknickers which combined the bodice and knickers into one garment. The commentary on this video is so incredibly bizarre; it's worth listening to, just very obviously from a different place and time. If you only have time to watch one scene right now though, make it the striptease with both Bettie Page and Tempest Storm, starting around the 6:00 minute mark.Before Victoria's Secret, Frederick's of Hollywood was the lingerie name on the tip of everyone's tongue. They are either family photos, ones I have taken or from my lovingly put together collection of rescued photographs, films or postcards.

Even aertex knickers were exciting at times, and they were on sale from me in a whole range of pantees and knickers styles. Over the decades, the waistline has evolved and while I am happy to know that French Knickers are still very much a thing, they now tend to be more of a shape that sits on your hip rather than the high waists that we associate with our Mid-Century period. This young woman is clearly posing for the camera as her knickers are briefer than most of us liked to wear in reality, but in most other ways she is typical of my day. Back home after the walk we would often remove our dresses and sit in the garden, admiring each others’ knickers and other underwear in the sunshine.

Cuff-leg pantees are certainly nice and cool and airy to wear for the summer, so it makes sense that she would choose to wear her pantees. Here, a woman has tucked her pinny into her knickers, and I’m sure that those people working behind her were all enjoying her beautiful, knickered bottom all day long! This truly was the Mid-Century wonder fabric, a good example of scientific developments influencing fashion, and exploded into the 1950s in the form of full wide petticoats to go under the “New Look” style dresses (thank you to Christian Dior for introducing the flattering, feminine shape using obscenely generous amounts of fabric to twirl away the deprivation of the war years! The French Knicker shape may have tailed off into the ‘50s and ‘60s, but in the 1970s there came a fabulous resurgence of the romantic lace and frills of bygone eras with designers such as Janet Reger introducing a new generation of women to the feminine joys of French Knickers and Camisoles, and our Camiknickers evolved into Teddies. This Page is for old underwear pictures of all sorts, so if anyone has any to send in, please do as this site is for you all to enjoy.

Whilst smaller “panties” started to become popular into the 1950s and 1960s, the French Knicker style still prevailed and I currently have an amazing collection of 1960s nylon knickers from iconic lingerie label “Vanity Fair” in the traditional wide-legged “shorts” style, in eye-popping bright citrus shades. It's the last vintage video (but don't go away because there's one more video you'll want to see below)!

In my experience a woman usually put on an older pair of bloomers (directoire knickers) for the farming occasions, and she always enjoyed every minute of her knickers being looked at by everyone. I grew up knowing that most men adored women’s bloomers, and of course, girl’s knickers, too, and I soon discovered that life in a remote, country village was far more knickers-orientated than any town or city, anywhere! Slips have more or less fallen out of fashion, but they used to be a vital part of every woman's wardrobe.