the product of ingenious engineering, inside and out. 

 The use of shirring and skillful cutting and handling of 

 fabric focused attention on the bust line, while the 

 frequent use of Lastex tended to streamline the hips 

 like a girdle. Inside, the careful use of wire and plastic 

 boning permitted many of these suits to assume a 

 shape of their own and e\en to be worn without 

 straps. 



A short-lived revival of the covered-up look ap- 

 peared in the fashion pages in 1954 but, unlike the 

 suits with covered arms and neck of the pre\ious 

 century, these suits drew attention to the parts of 

 the body that were covered. The fate of this un- 

 successful novelty is a good illustration of the fact 

 that, ultimately, the buyer has the final word in the 

 \olatile field of feminine fashion. The swim suit 

 manufacturers apparently misinterpreted the Amer- 

 ican woman's readiness to discard the more revealing 

 two-piece suit in favor of an altered form of the 

 maillot. Always ready with novelties to make last 

 years suit obsolete, the manufacturers tried to en- 

 courage women into a more extreme covered-up 

 look. Despite the power of national advertising women 

 were tinwilling to go back in time. The female beach- 

 goer and sun-worshiper opposed a suit that might 

 interfere with the tanning process. 



By 1 960, the production of swim suits had become 

 a big business with mass distribution and mass mar- 

 kets. Expanded world-wide transportation facilities 

 and increased leisure and afRuence in the United 

 States created a demand for midwinter vacation 

 clothing for vise in warmer climates, and the manu- 

 facturing of swim suits became a year-round under- 

 taking, producing 14,728 million knitted and woven 

 suits in women's, misses, and junior sizes in 1960.''^ 



Conclusions 



The earliest bathing dress for women in the United 

 States may have been an old smock or shift, followed 

 by a bathing gown based on the shift or chemise. 

 Although women's bathing and swimming costume 

 achieved an identity of its own during the 19th 

 century, the evolution of this garb followed certain 



"* Compiled from "Production of Selected Items of Knit 

 Outerwear and Swimwear; 1960-1961," Apparel Sun^ey 196 1 

 (1962), series M23.\( 6 1)-2, p. 14. 



inno\ations in women's underclothing, namely, 

 drawers in the first half of the 19th century, the 

 "combination" of the late 1870s, and the brassiere 

 and panties of the 1930s. The greatest number of 

 minor style changes, however, were direct reflections 

 of fashions in street dress. The rising hemline and, 

 at times, the discarding of a skirt during periods 

 when women wore long dresses for other activities 

 can be attributed to changes caused by the func- 

 tional requirements of bathing and swimming; the 

 shortening of sleeves and trousers in the last quarter 

 of the 19th century were also functional improve- 

 ments. The benefits of the shorter trousers, however, 

 were minimized when modesty required women to 

 co\er their exposed legs with stockings. 



Swimming suits have been considered a 20th 

 centiuy innovation; in fact one corporation is under 

 the impression that a member of their staff was 

 responsible for the first use of the term "swimming 

 suit" early in the century. The findings presented 

 in this paper show that some women were wearing 

 "swimming suits"' that were distinctly different 

 from bathing dresses as early as the 1870s and that both 

 co-existed for some 50 years. Bathing dresses disap- 

 peared in the 1920s with the widespread acceptance 

 of its fimctional counterpart; "bathing suit" iio 

 longer referred to a special type of costume but became 

 interchangeable with the term "swimming suit." 



The insistent trend toward more functional costume 

 reached its ultimate conclusion with the refinements 

 of the knitted swimming suit in the 1930s. Subsequent 

 changes ha\e not improxed upon the fimctional 

 design of this classic suit. In many instances these 

 variations have been merely to satisfy the feiuinine 

 desire for distinctive apparel and the industry's 

 need for perishable fashions. Female competitive 

 swimmers have continued to wear the simple knitted 

 suit — now of nylon rather than wool. 



The changes since the 1930s have shown a trend 

 toward diminution in the coverage of the swimming 

 suit. One cannot be certain what this means for the 

 future, but it is unlikely that either the swim suit 

 industry or standards of modesty of the near future 

 will permit a total elimination of swimming costmne. 

 \Ve can be assured, however, that so long as women 

 swim, they will not repeat history by swathing them- 

 selves with yards of fabric. 



U S GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE: 1969 



