Even a cursory examination of contemporary design reveals a strong tendency to borrow from the past. Yet, the reinterpretation of historical silhouettes or details is far from a modern phenomenon. Women of the early 1910s wore gowns that drew on popular fashions a century earlier, for example, and women in the midst of a Victoriana craze in the 1930s found that dresses with gigot sleeves, crinolines, and bustles were once again fashionable. RetroSpective examines fashion’s fascination with its own history by presenting an overview of historical references in fashion, paying particular attention to recurrence of silhouette.
Museum at the Fashion Institute of Technology
State University of New York
