What will be interesting will be to examine our ideas of what clothing will
be like 20 years from now, 20-30 years from now to see how far off the mark
we were...
Back in grade school, when we still had weekly "Assembly" marked by
performances from each class in the grade (each week a different class),
one of the classes put on a "history of fashion" show. I recall this being
during the 1967-68 school year, and the group of classes was first- and
second-graders (6-, 7-, and 8-year-olds). The show ended with a look at
"fashions of the future" which, for the purpose of the presentation, was
approximately 1980. The two girls modelling this "look" were wearing
metallic-looking clothes (I believe one had on a jumper of silvery
bonded-knit lamé, with a gold large-link chain belt worn at hip-level).
Around us, the NASA space program was in full-swing and we fully expected
to be able to travel to the Moon and Mars easily within our lifetimes --
the cartoon program _The Jetsons_ was a very plausible "future reality" for
us. The metallics represented the future for us, space travel and space
suits and the idea of these lines and fabrics trickling down into everyday
apparel.
As it turned out, the only element of that grade-school "fashion show" that
was "prescient" about 1980 is that we still had some below-the-waist styles
of lower-garments -- hip-huggers had not yet died out completely. On the
other hand, George Jetson's front-ladder-laced polo shirt is little more
than a solid-color version of the broad-striped "rugby shirt" of the
'seventies and early 'eighties, or today's ubiquitous polo shirt -- and the
highly-structured collars and shoulder treatments of Jane and Judy Jetsons'
dresses survived, morphed into the ultra-broad-shouldered, structured and
highly-graphically-oriented "power suits" Bob Mackie created for the
"Alexis Carrington Colby" character in _Dynasty_.
Some of the more dystopic looks at the future would have had us all in "Mao
suits" by now; yet the women's "power suit" of the '80's (ref John T.
Malloy, "The Women's Dress for Success Book") is almost impossible to find
in a modern cut and many workplaces encourage creativity in
self-presentation to a degree that would have seemed unthinkable even a
deacade ago.
So... camoflage "Mao" suits with metal plate interlinings? Shirts and
shifts because nobody can afford outer garments (except the very rich)?
All-natural fibers? All synthetic fibers? Holographically-projected
clothing (now *there's* "The Emperor's New Suit of Clothes" for ya...)
Brenda
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