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I think there are a couple of important things missing from this article. One is that until relatively recently clothing served a very different function to tha

I think there are a couple of important things missing from this article. One is that until relatively recently clothing served a very different function to that of today. In Europe, in our grandparents’ or even parents’ childhoods - as late even as the 1970s - housing and transport was very different to how it is now. Clothing was largely purpose-specific; people had far fewer clothes than today but those clothes had more specific purposes. For men that mean different weights of woollen suits for spring and autumn versus winter, and linen suits for summer. Houses weren’t so well insulated or heated so you dressed to stay warm. With cars less common, you dressed for the outdoors. Hats weren’t fashion statements: they were to help keep you dry and warm. Go back 100+ years and roads were much worse, people travelled by horse. Capes, gloves, boots: things like this were all a defence against mud and rain and weather. If you were riding a horse you needed something like a cape with a high collar to stop your back and face getting splattered with mud thrown up by the horse’s hooves. But more importantly, at the wealthy end of society, dressing was an indication of status and leisure. The clothes in the first picture are clearly somewhat impractical, but that doesn’t matter if your only task for the day is to sit and talk or stroll gently. If you have a team of people to dress you and look after your clothing you can wear impractical layers of clothing that seem ridiculous today. Those layers were still designed to serve a purpose - largely keeping warm - but the application and design of that purpose became exaggerated as purpose took a subsidiary role to status. Many countries also had “sumptuary laws” which forbid lower classes of people from using certain fabrics or colours or dressing in particular ways. This meant that clothing for the higher classes was an articulation of power and status: in the 17th century you could tell instantly from someone’s style of dress whether they were a peasant, farmer, merchant, or aristocrat. That articulation of status - for the highest classes - meant that clothing was designed to show off the elements of dress that were reserved to that class of people.

jszymborski 2y ago
> Hats weren’t fashion statements: they were to help keep you dry and warm. And my understand I'd they also kept you safe. While a bowler hat may seem posh now, I believe it was a working class hat which was favored for its hard-hat like properties.
dimitar 2y ago
Well you can make the case that people don't have to dress a certain way because we are much better insulated (metaphorically and literally) from the environment. And there are of course no sumptuary laws. So clothing can be more fun, if people want to of course - look at how music subcultures have incredibly varied ways of expression through clothing - metalheads, hiphopheads, punks etc.
- atoav 2y ago
  I think you hit gold there, todays lack of interesting clothes is in my eyes related to two things: - market logic made work clothes boring (think about guild clothing, the only interesting thing I see from time to time is the chimney sweeper) - less people are inclined to feel part of a subculture and/or express that in their fashion choices As someone who was a teenager in the 2000s, back then I had at least 6 different outwardly recognizable subcultures in my school class (Metalhead, Punk, Hiphop, Emo, Raver, Goth) and that was more or less normal within my generation. My small brother and nieces were teenagers during the mid 2010s and in their class all people looked the same. Not only did they look the same, they felt the pressure to all look the same and get similar brands and so on. It just appears that it is a more conforming generation, maybe due tonthe role social media started to play for them. When I grew up social media existed but in a class of 25 maybe half would use it (maximum). And all social media algorithms were strictly chronological.
  - 082349872349872 2y ago
    So how, instead of with clothing, do subcultures express themselves now? By choice of memes? Which fanfic they read? Do people wear boring clothes but pick subculture-signifying avatars? EDIT: Looks like goths are still a thing? https://www.youtube.com/shorts/zjg1P_2IPOQ https://www.youtube.com/shorts/zjg1P_2IPOQ
    - colechristensen 2y ago
      What happened is all of the counterculture/subcultures/whatever got so popular and kind of mellowed out and melted together into a bunch of samey stuff. Like how music went through this phase where "not mainstream" music started getting really cool but now all of those sounds are just what everything sounds like now, you can't rebel against mainstream music right now.
dredmorbius 2y ago
Re: boots. In a world dominated by animal-powered transport, especially in cities, boots weren't optional, and they were high to keep the muck from soiling your trousers / dress hems. (As I'd recently commented in another thread: <https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42326115 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42326115>.) (Women if at all possible didn't walk streets, though of course that was a privilege largely restricted to the wealthy.)
space_oddity 2y ago
How the purpose of clothing has shifted over time, and I think a lot of it boils down to the balance between utility and status
082349872349872 2y ago
the "lap dog" used to be a heating accessory
gspencley 2y ago
> Those layers were still designed to serve a purpose - largely keeping warm Yes and no. Something that people often take for granted is doing laundry. The invention of the automatic clothes washer and dryer changed things dramatically. Before automation, laundry day for a household of 4 was a huge, laborious, and often multi-day task. Not only did garments need to be washed by hand, but there was a lot of attention to how to clean certain types of garments and fabrics effectively. A woman's summer dress with grass stains on the bottom hems, for example, needed different treatment than a man's 3 piece grey suit (which, by the way, were constructed very differently than they are today). Since you needed your stove-top to heat water, most laundry was done in the kitchen which meant that you also needed to plan in advance what your family was going to eat that day and have things prepared. I own a recreation Edwardian era 3 piece suit. It has no zippers and it is unlined (I recently wore this to a funeral here in Canada and it was COLD despite the layers that I was wearing). The reason that the suit is unlined is because, as you say, it was common at the time to wear layers. So the thing is shockingly breathable and light compared to a modern, lined formal suit (which is also made out of different suiting wool so the texture is different too, an Edwardian suit "feels" less formal than a modern suit). But the reason people wore those layers was not always necessarily to stay warm. In fact, the layers were worn in the summer in hot climates as well as during winter in cold climates. Today people often assume that full body undergarments were born out of a prudish sense of modesty (a la "magic Mormon underwear"). This is a myth. The reality is that they: a) kept the outer garment clean for longer by avoiding direct contact with the skin (and thus sweat etc.) and b) they gave everyone in the family roughly the same general style of undergarment (in terms of colour and fabric) so that you could batch-wash what needs to be washed most often all together in a single pot on the stove Here's a good YouTube video that really puts into perspective why laundry was so different pre-automation, and it was one major factor (though not the only one) that informed how people dressed: https://youtu.be/88Wv0xZBSTI?si=c-YEogtMyy8pAFlA https://youtu.be/88Wv0xZBSTI?si=c-YEogtMyy8pAFlA
- ljm 2y ago
  I wonder how much this relates to the placement of a washing machine and/or dryer. It's typically in the kitchen in a British household, unless you have a house with a utility room or an old outdoor toilet (growing up, my house had an external downstairs toilet but it was just used for storage and the washing machine). When I moved abroad though it wasn't unusual to see the washer/dryer in the bathroom. > But the reason people wore those layers was not always necessarily to stay warm. In fact, the layers were worn in the summer in hot climates as well as during winter in cold climates. This still holds up today. Can't speak for anywhere else but in the UK people will go out in 30ºC weather in an anorak or puffer jacket with a hoodie and tee underneath. The exact opposite of us northern British types who go out in winter wearing just one light layer at 5ºC (tee + jeans, top + skirt).
rahimnathwani 2y ago
For men that mean different weights of woollen suits for spring and autumn versus winter, and linen suits for summer. Never has an HN comment made me feel so old.

jszymborski 2y ago

> Hats weren’t fashion statements: they were to help keep you dry and warm. And my understand I'd they also kept you safe. While a bowler hat may seem posh now, I believe it was a working class hat which was favored for its hard-hat like properties.

dimitar 2y ago

Well you can make the case that people don't have to dress a certain way because we are much better insulated (metaphorically and literally) from the environment. And there are of course no sumptuary laws. So clothing can be more fun, if people want to of course - look at how music subcultures have incredibly varied ways of expression through clothing - metalheads, hiphopheads, punks etc.

atoav 2y ago
I think you hit gold there, todays lack of interesting clothes is in my eyes related to two things: - market logic made work clothes boring (think about guild clothing, the only interesting thing I see from time to time is the chimney sweeper) - less people are inclined to feel part of a subculture and/or express that in their fashion choices As someone who was a teenager in the 2000s, back then I had at least 6 different outwardly recognizable subcultures in my school class (Metalhead, Punk, Hiphop, Emo, Raver, Goth) and that was more or less normal within my generation. My small brother and nieces were teenagers during the mid 2010s and in their class all people looked the same. Not only did they look the same, they felt the pressure to all look the same and get similar brands and so on. It just appears that it is a more conforming generation, maybe due tonthe role social media started to play for them. When I grew up social media existed but in a class of 25 maybe half would use it (maximum). And all social media algorithms were strictly chronological.
- 082349872349872 2y ago
  So how, instead of with clothing, do subcultures express themselves now? By choice of memes? Which fanfic they read? Do people wear boring clothes but pick subculture-signifying avatars? EDIT: Looks like goths are still a thing? https://www.youtube.com/shorts/zjg1P_2IPOQ https://www.youtube.com/shorts/zjg1P_2IPOQ
  - colechristensen 2y ago
    What happened is all of the counterculture/subcultures/whatever got so popular and kind of mellowed out and melted together into a bunch of samey stuff. Like how music went through this phase where "not mainstream" music started getting really cool but now all of those sounds are just what everything sounds like now, you can't rebel against mainstream music right now.

dredmorbius 2y ago

Re: boots. In a world dominated by animal-powered transport, especially in cities, boots weren't optional, and they were high to keep the muck from soiling your trousers / dress hems. (As I'd recently commented in another thread: <https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42326115 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42326115>.) (Women if at all possible didn't walk streets, though of course that was a privilege largely restricted to the wealthy.)

space_oddity 2y ago

How the purpose of clothing has shifted over time, and I think a lot of it boils down to the balance between utility and status

082349872349872 2y ago

the "lap dog" used to be a heating accessory

gspencley 2y ago

> Those layers were still designed to serve a purpose - largely keeping warm Yes and no. Something that people often take for granted is doing laundry. The invention of the automatic clothes washer and dryer changed things dramatically. Before automation, laundry day for a household of 4 was a huge, laborious, and often multi-day task. Not only did garments need to be washed by hand, but there was a lot of attention to how to clean certain types of garments and fabrics effectively. A woman's summer dress with grass stains on the bottom hems, for example, needed different treatment than a man's 3 piece grey suit (which, by the way, were constructed very differently than they are today). Since you needed your stove-top to heat water, most laundry was done in the kitchen which meant that you also needed to plan in advance what your family was going to eat that day and have things prepared. I own a recreation Edwardian era 3 piece suit. It has no zippers and it is unlined (I recently wore this to a funeral here in Canada and it was COLD despite the layers that I was wearing). The reason that the suit is unlined is because, as you say, it was common at the time to wear layers. So the thing is shockingly breathable and light compared to a modern, lined formal suit (which is also made out of different suiting wool so the texture is different too, an Edwardian suit "feels" less formal than a modern suit). But the reason people wore those layers was not always necessarily to stay warm. In fact, the layers were worn in the summer in hot climates as well as during winter in cold climates. Today people often assume that full body undergarments were born out of a prudish sense of modesty (a la "magic Mormon underwear"). This is a myth. The reality is that they: a) kept the outer garment clean for longer by avoiding direct contact with the skin (and thus sweat etc.) and b) they gave everyone in the family roughly the same general style of undergarment (in terms of colour and fabric) so that you could batch-wash what needs to be washed most often all together in a single pot on the stove Here's a good YouTube video that really puts into perspective why laundry was so different pre-automation, and it was one major factor (though not the only one) that informed how people dressed: https://youtu.be/88Wv0xZBSTI?si=c-YEogtMyy8pAFlA https://youtu.be/88Wv0xZBSTI?si=c-YEogtMyy8pAFlA

ljm 2y ago
I wonder how much this relates to the placement of a washing machine and/or dryer. It's typically in the kitchen in a British household, unless you have a house with a utility room or an old outdoor toilet (growing up, my house had an external downstairs toilet but it was just used for storage and the washing machine). When I moved abroad though it wasn't unusual to see the washer/dryer in the bathroom. > But the reason people wore those layers was not always necessarily to stay warm. In fact, the layers were worn in the summer in hot climates as well as during winter in cold climates. This still holds up today. Can't speak for anywhere else but in the UK people will go out in 30ºC weather in an anorak or puffer jacket with a hoodie and tee underneath. The exact opposite of us northern British types who go out in winter wearing just one light layer at 5ºC (tee + jeans, top + skirt).

rahimnathwani 2y ago

For men that mean different weights of woollen suits for spring and autumn versus winter, and linen suits for summer. Never has an HN comment made me feel so old.