This decade contrasts with the
last decade as women’s wear bounced back to a more masculine look, pantsuits,
day wear, overalls, women emerging into the work place more meant that they
needed more practical clothing. This decade was very different to previous
decades in fashion as unlike other eras where women wore specific dresses in
length and style very similar to each other, in the 70's women would where a
large variety of clothing like skirts,
pants, pants suits, dresses. From the previous decades with a specific hem
length for each decade changed as in this decade hemlines varied as skirts
could be seen in different lengths; mini, midi or maxi. For eveningwear women
often wore full length maxi dresses, evening trousers or glamorous halter neck
catsuits.
The
hippie flower child look from the late 1960s carried over into the first half
of the decade in a non-restrictive bohemian silhouette with a heavy folksy
influence. This allowed people to embrace the non-silhouette look with loose
fitted clothing and allowed the embrace of different ethic culture styles, with
Indian style prints, free flowing clothing, breezy gauzy tent dresses and wide
legged pants.
Trousers and trouser suits were
serious fashions in the 1970s. Pants began gently flared and reached wide bell
bottom proportions by about 1975. This then began to slowly reduce again to
wide, straight leg, until by the end of the 70’s they reduced back to a narrow
leg. Popular fabrics included heavy crepes, wool jersey knits, Courtelle jersey
and woven Polyester suiting such as Trevira. Colour was an important thing in
the 70’s as Emerald green, apple green and bottle green were all favoured
fashion colours of the early 1970s.
The decade for disco. The 1970’s
was the era where disco became the craze Disco looks began in the 1970s and was
memorable for its hot pants look and Spandex tops. Shiny clinging Lycra stretch
disco pants in hot strident shiny colours with stretch sequin bandeau tops were
often adaptations of professional modern dance wear that found itself making an
impact in discos as disco dancing became serious. Gold lame, leopard skin and
stretch halter jumpsuits and white clothes that glowed in Ultra Violet lights
capture the 70s Disco fashion perfectly. Satin jackets that reflected the light
and a medallion resting on a tanned chest in an open neck shirt with the collar
turned up were de rigueur.
Media also played a part in the up
building of the population for disco; Films like Saturday Night Fever of 1977
as John Travolta illustrates in the header, emphasised how important the
importance of the weekend after a long working week, persuading people to go
out the weekend for ‘disco’. Posing clothes designed to show off the body and
made in materials like figure moulding stretch Lycra were ideal.