70’s Fashion influences and history
The fashion of the 70’s was influenced by a whole plethora of
different older styles. Obviously the hippy style of the late 60’s was
still pretty much present, but there was also a certain type of
nostalgia for fast fashion trends and of course very strong ethnic
influences spurred on by the fact that people could travel easier.
 As
the decade progressed at first there was nostalgia for the 20’s and 30’s
and then as time passed it moved on to the 40’s and 50’s and then to the
Edwardian era. All of this was happening on the backdrop of disco music,
polyester, and platform shoes. One major influence on the fashion of
the 70’s was nostalgia for decades past. In England, The Biba label made
popular a look which was based on the fashion of the 20’s and 30’s and
at the beginning of the decade there was this brief moment when checked
tweed Oxford Bags wore being worn by men and women alike. Where formal
occasions were concerned, the 70’s were definitely more relaxed than the
60’s, but even so men still wore suits at the office and on formal
occasions.
 Women generally wore long dresses on formal occasions which
were usually influenced by older styles, but combined with design ideas
and choices from the hippy era and sometimes colors which were popular
in the 30’s. Long hair continued to be fashionable in the 70’s for
both men and women and beards were popular as well, these trends being
largely hangovers from the 60’s. When it came to casual wear the 70’s
were definitely the decade when jeans got a definite foothold on the
market. At first they weren’t at all different from the jeans of the
60’s but as the decade progressed more and more people started wearing
flared bell bottoms and printed t-shirts. This comfort of this new
casual look was increased by the increasing popularity of trainer and
running shoes that started appearing in the 70’s thanks to Nike being
created in 1972. The bell bottom fad peaked sometime around the middle
of the decade and then gradually pants started returning to their more
normal dimensions, although flares were still popular towards the end of
the decade.
Then at the end of the 70’s punk fashion came into the forefront for a
brief period of time rejecting everything that came before it and
setting the scene for a completely different decade. Even so, the 70’s
remains a special period simply because it managed to draw the attention
of everyone towards fashion. Both men and women started to be interested
in all types of trends and no one was left out of this current. In the
past, men were often left out or simply weren’t attracted to the choices
offered by a certain period in time, but the 70’s were surely great for
every person. |
