Real Clothes, Real Lives: 200 Years of What Women Wore

This book explores how American women from different backgrounds have lived, worked, and dressed over the past 200 years, featuring over 300 garments and accessories from the Smith College Historic Clothing Collection. It highlights the changing roles of women and the modest and inexpensive garments they wore, including a World War I uniform and a 1970s go-go dancer's costume.

Format: Hardback
Length: 256 pages
Publication date: 05 September 2023
Publisher: Rizzoli International Publications

An unparalleled exploration of women's everyday attire, spanning from Sylvia Plath's Girl Scout uniform to psychedelic microminis, business suits, and fast-food workers' uniforms, is presented in this captivating volume. This fascinating chronicle reveals how American women from diverse backgrounds have lived, worked, and dressed for over two centuries.

In its groundbreaking approach, Real Clothes, Real Lives focuses on the everyday clothing of ordinary American women, a subject often overlooked in fashion histories. The book showcases over 300 garments and accessories from the Smith College Historic Clothing Collection, offering a unique perspective on the lives of countless anonymous women. Through the lens of dress, this extraordinary survey illuminates how women's roles have undergone significant transformations throughout the decades.

Each garment holds a rich tapestry of stories, encompassing the woman who wore it, the one who crafted or purchased it, and the context in which it was worn. Whether homemade or ready-made, many of the garments are modest and affordable, reflecting the popular styles of their respective eras. Among the many remarkable examples are a rare World War I uniform worn by an American woman working behind enemy lines and a 1970s go-go dancer's costume.

Exceptional photography and rich archival visuals accompany the highly readable texts, providing a wealth of historical and social analysis of a facet of fashion and feminism that is seldom considered. This captivating volume offers a profound exploration of the ways in which clothing has shaped and reflected the lives of women throughout history.

Weight: 1440g
Dimension: 222 x 287 x 27 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9780847873135