1940s Lingerie ~ Frou Frou Fashionista - Luxury Lingerie Blog for Faire Frou Frou

Tuesday, July 15

1940s Lingerie


In our miniseries on lingerie through the decades, this post celebrates lingerie from the 1940s. As you can see, all of the ads are very sweet and proper, which adds to their timeless appeal.
During our search for images, we found more hosiery ads than anything and a lot of adds for seamless shapewear...something we are still trying to perfect today (it looks like Spanx isn't so original after all)!
It was actually a bit challenging to find images of lingerie from the 1940s (and every decade for that matter, now that we're doing this). It turns out that many of the ads that we originally thought were for lingerie, ended up being for swimwear. Almost every celeb during that time was photographed in a swimsuit, but not so much in a bra and panties. Granted, we're talking about a time when it first became acceptable for women to wear pants.
It seems like the hot lingerie items of the 1940s were slips, girdles, stockings and peignoir sets (which is typically a long flowing robe and chemise combination for those of you who have no idea what that is!).
Okay, next post is lingerie of the 1950s!!!

4 fabulous comments:

Anonymous said...

Nothing like pin-ups! Hope I win the book. Need to save $$$ for lingerie housing. If you are selling the beautiful wardrobe in your shop, do let me know.

Unknown said...

thanks katie! i don't think i will ever sell the wardrobe in my store because i don't think anyone would pay the crazy amount i paid for it!!!
xo

Anonymous said...

I am a fashion designer working towards begining my own fashion design line...very different from what is out right now I DO NOT follow trends. I used to like Betty Paige, but now, I just think that she is a bore. It get's old with her. As far as lingerie goes, it also gets very old. In reality, all lingerie really is about is "a different woman speaking through to it" Push up here, more of that, sexy this, provacative that. Everything has pretty much been done with lingerie. Nothing today is new, just being repeated
and in some of the worst ways, your trully:Victoria's Secret-YUCK.
Provacative sexuality is what their campaigns are about. Wacoal is many many times better. Just look at the lingerie Vintage catalogs on this site. The LADIES♥
look very natural and very nice and they make lingerie look very heavenly. Then look at today's lingerie models. They look like sluts or through body language, initiating sexual body language.
Just compare them for yourself. Lingerie and women...that is like the Twilight Zone in the planet of Venus, if only it was not very hot.
It is beautiful though and I love your site♥♥ Thank You

Anonymous said...

A beautiful web site. I love the look and feel of vintage lingerie from the 30s and 40s. The cute little lace trimmed step-ins in silks and satins, shorty bloomers, panties, and teddies. Too much modern lingerie is not deserving of the name, looks more like athletic wear designed for the locker room. Vicky's produced some lovely lingerie in the earlier days (tap pants and teddies), but now they produce mostly boring undergarments not worth being seen. Lingerie was meant to be romantic, yet demure. Full coverage briefs (see Secrets in Lace) are far sexier than the dreaded thong, which gives away the store and can only work on some bodies anyway. Lingerie designers have been shrinking panties since the days of ankle length bloomers. I suppose it was a natural development, but not a pretty one. They should have stopped about half way, with waist high panties and soft flowing step-ins. Incidentally, the term "tap pants" was not used before the 1970s, but is now retroactively applied to open leg panties of the 1920s to 60s. Ads from that earlier time called them step-ins, or simply panties.