Fashion (WWII)

Find archive articles on WW II Fashion from the 1940’s. Our site has great information from old magazine and newspaper articles on WW II fashion trends.

A Patriotic Argument for Shorter Skirts (Newsweek Magazine, 1941)

Months before the attack on Pearl Harbor, Washington was gearing-up for the fight by restricting the availability of certain fabrics to the fashion industry and diverting these materials to the defense industry. This started an open discussion in fashion circles as to whether it would simply be best to raise the hemlines until the national emergency was over.

The Fashion Originators Guild termed shorter skirts silly and added that dresses ‘are just as short today as decency and grace will permit.

A Patriotic Argument for Shorter Skirts (Newsweek Magazine, 1941) Read More »

Novelty ”Victory Fashion” Makes An Appearance (Newsweek Magazine, 1941)

It’s hard to believe – but Victory Fashion hit the American home front before it was even called the home front. However by mid-1941 Americans were pretty outraged by fascist aggression: the U-boats, London bombed, Nanking ravaged, France invaded – the list goes on. When this article went to press, we were not in the war but we were firmly on the Allied side. The word victory made its way into fashion circles and the nation’s couturiers began turning out novelty accessories and garments. Even the hairdressers contributed.

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The World War Two Origins of the T-Shirt (Men’s Wear Magazine, 1950)

A couple of paragraphs from a popular fashion industry trade magazine that pointed out that the white cotton knit crew-neck garment we call the T-shirt came into this world with the name quarter sleeve and had it’s origin in the U.S. Navy where it earned it’s popularity and soon spread to other branches of the U.S. military during the mid-to-late 1930s. When the war ended in 1945 the T-shirt was the only element of the uniform that American men wanted to keep.


There was another fashion innovations of W.W. II, click here to read about it…

The World War Two Origins of the T-Shirt (Men’s Wear Magazine, 1950) Read More »

The Ike Jacket Goes Mainstream (Collier’s Magazine, 1944)

In their book about American soldiers in the war-torn Britain of W.W. II, Overpaid, Over-Sexed and Over Herestyle=border:none (1991), authors James Goodson and Norman Franks recall how thoroughly impressed Americans were with the standard issue British Army uniform. The Supreme Allied Commander, U.S. General Dwight Eisenhower, was no exception – he promptly ordered his tailor to suit him in a similar get-up. Other American generals followed in his path as did the cocky young pilots of the Army Air Corps – shortly there after the look soon spread to other branches of the Army. This 1944 article discusses the broad appeal of this jacket and that civilian fashion designers had begun manufacturing the Ike Jacket for the Home Front.

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The Hat Superstition that was Reliable… (Pathfinder Magazine, 1945)

As far as superstitions and clothing are concerned, hats seem to be the one garment that has the most unfounded and irrational precepts attached to their existence. Plentiful are the dictates pertaining to where hats should never be placed or worn – these superstitions existed centuries before the Second World War, but for one citizen of San Angelo, Texas, he had his own beliefs where hats are concerned and some believed that, as a result, he was able to save the lives of 56 American servicemen…

The Hat Superstition that was Reliable… (Pathfinder Magazine, 1945) Read More »