FASHION
IN THE TIME OF THE
GREAT GATSBY
LaLonnie Lehman
SHIRE PUBLICATIONS
CONTENTS
CAPTURING THE
1920S
THE GOOD TIMES
WOMEN’S FASHIONS
MEN’S FASHIONS
ACCESSORIES FOR WOMEN AND MEN
PLACES TO VISIT
FURTHER READING
The cover for the first edition of The Great Gatsby, published in 1925.
CAPTURING THE 1920S
P
Woodrow Wilson’s demand that America take on new responsibilities of world
leadership afterWorldWar I was rejected as the war brought feelings of disillusion and alienation
to most of the youth of America. By the 1920s, they were choosing to ignore the problems of the
country and live for the moment instead of the future.
These young people became the focus of attention when they adopted a cynical, romantic attitude
toward life and embraced new ideas. “Youthful” was the new byword for America. Coupled with the
affluence of America during the 1920s, the new attitudes led to the increased consumption of goods
and the establishment of leisure-time sites such as dance halls, nightclubs, sports arenas, amusement
parks and movie theaters.
Female emancipation gathered pace after the war as many women refused to return to prewar
ideals of domesticity. Women gained the vote in 1920, attended and earned degrees at colleges and
universities, moved into professional workplaces and participated in new leisure activities.
These changes in society brought a drastic shift in culture and morals. Drinking, dancing, smoking
cigarettes and driving automobiles by both men and women was criticized by the older generation and
admired by the new. The mass production of cheap newspapers, tabloids and magazines meant that all
classes could read about current and sensational events.
Into this atmosphere came one of America’s most-read novels of the period: The Great Gatsby,
published in 1925. Written by F. Scott Fitzgerald, the celebrated author of other novels and many
magazine articles, The Great Gatsby embodied the lifestyle of the Roaring Twenties—a sophisticated
life that included hard liquor, cigarettes, expensive cars, love affairs, new dances, new jazz music, and
new fashions. This appealed to young men and women eager to get on with an exciting life. Fitzgerald
wrote, “The uncertainties of 1919 were over—America was going on the greatest, gaudiest spree in
history.”
Fitzgerald’s characters reflected his own values. He was educated at Princeton but left before
graduating, served in the United States Army in 1917–19, and made his living by writing. After he
married Zelda in 1920, they lived the life of the Jazz Age: a decadent social and private life on the
urban East Coast, a few years in Paris and traveling in Europe. They lived like other artists of the
1920s by spending lavishly, purchasing expensive automobiles, drinking heavily, and throwing and
attending parties. Descriptions of parties in The Great Gatsby included many guests, full orchestras,
and dancing into the wee hours.
RESIDENT
A 1925 cartoon that shows a young man in a “jalopy” smoking a cigarette in a long cigarette
holder and holding a flask containing spirits. The young flapper stepping on the running
board shows her hosiery rolled down below her knee as she applies lipstick and looks in the
mirror of her compact.
Front cover illustration by Helen Dryden for Delineator, a women’s magazine which featured
fashion, sewing patterns, and fiction.
‘The Dancing Marathon’, an illustration in Judge (May 1923).
The change in morals during the 1920s was more pronounced for young women, as they moved
about without chaperones, wore new hairstyles, used makeup and lived independently. Young women
also overthrew accepted posture, speech and etiquette. Their presence and manners revealed a new
woman who could engage in all of the activities that were acceptable for men.
The new sport of skiing in mountain resorts in America and Europe required specific
fashionable clothing. A dark tweed wool sweater with leather belt is worn with a divided
skirt. A wool sweater with circle designs is worn with breeches. Soft, oiled ski shoes with
wool ski socks, wool gloves, a colorful scarf and a helmet-style cap complete the outfit.
Clothing fashions for American men and women quickly expanded to accommodate the new
lifestyle of the 1920s. Clothing for men featured new garments and softer tailoring. For women, the
shortening of skirts and revamping of the corset affected the wearer’s silhouette, movement and
comfort. The introduction of sports clothing allowed both men and women to participate in sports in
comfort.
This group of couples are dancing to the new jazz music. The men are in suits that are kept
buttoned while the women are in short dresses with fullness below the hipline, and plunging
backs. The woman in blue wears shoes and a cloche hat that match the color of her dress.
THE GOOD TIMES
A
1920s was “Eat, drink and be merry—for tomorrow we may die.” Many
young Americans, often called the flaming youth, were rejecting the etiquette of the past and
daring to create a new style of living. The young women were described as restless, seductive, greedy,
and unrestrained. The young men were labeled cynical. They led the way in flouting the law and talked
about living in a world ruined by their elders. In The Great Gatsby Myrtle says about her first meeting
with Tom “…you can’t live forever; you can’t live forever.”
For the first time, men and women consumed alcohol together, bringing about a major social
change. Prohibition—the law that made the sale, transportation and manufacture of liquor illegal—
was established in 1919. The public rebellion against this law created an illegal industry, called
bootleg, of making, selling and transporting spirits. Rye whiskey and gin were two of the types of
alcohol most widely consumed illegally. The excitement of finding a place to consume alcohol and
avoid arrest was the focus of rebellious young men and women. The speakeasy, an establishment
which illegally sold alcoholic beverages, became a place where one could drink, have clandestine
affairs and dance while hoping to escape the notice of the police. Fitzgerald says in The Great Gatsby,
“The bottle of whiskey—a second one—was now in constant demand by all present…”
A postwar craze for automobiles brought monumental changes to the American lifestyle. The
availability and popularity of the automobile changed “courting” to “dating” (without chaperones) and
created the ability to travel quickly between city and country for work, parties and picnics. It provided
fun and recreation as “Sunday drives” became a leisure activity. Out of the way places, like
speakeasies, were accessible because of the auto. New slang terms like “jalopy” (an old car) and “flat
tire” (dull person) entered the popular lexicon.
The economy was transformed as the automobile became America’s biggest industry, consuming
steel, lead, rubber, nickel and gasoline. The automobile became a most desired commodity—by the
late 1920s more than 20 million cars had been registered.
POPULAR SLOGAN OF THE
This automobile, a 1929 Pierce Arrow Coupe with a rumble seat, represents the luxury cars
that were owned by wealthy Americans.
Most people could purchase an automobile. The rich bought Packard, Pierce Arrow, Stutz,
Cadillac, and Chrysler cars that were beautifully designed, colorful, powerful and expensive,
indicating high social status. Very expensive imported automobiles came from Belgium, France, and
Germany. The less wealthy bought the cheapest—the black utility Model T produced by Henry Ford.
Charles Lindbergh, working on The Spirit of St. Louis in c. 1927.
Information was readily available to the American public and brought commonality to all levels of
society. Newspapers and magazines, with their flashy headlines and color illustrations, fueled the
American public’s interest in events such as the visit of the Prince ofWales (later EdwardVIII) to the
United States, Amelia Earhart’s and Charles Lindbergh’s airplane flights and the discovery of the
tomb of Tutankhamen, an Egyptian pharaoh.
News and photos of sporting heroes, like baseball player Babe Ruth, swimmer Johnny
Weissmuller, boxer Jack Dempsey, and racehorse Man O’War, were consumed by eager readers.
Attending sporting events became a national affair. From baseball to horse racing, tennis, swimming,
football, boxing and golf, Americans went to these events to cheer for their heroes.
The New York Daily News, Daily Mirror, and Evening Graphic were smaller-format newspapers,
called tabloids, which printed sensational stories and pictures that young Americans craved. Life
magazine covers showcased drawings by John Held, Jr., that reflected the new culture and morality
with colorful amusing representations of the new dancing, women smoking, couples in swimsuits and
women driving cars. All of these publications were cheap, plentiful and sold on the streets.
Greta Garbo and John Gilbert in a film scene, 1927.
The Town & Country magazine chronicled the social events and leisure activities of the wealthy
families of NewYork, Boston and other cities where surnames appeared in the Social Register. The
Social Register listed names and addresses of prominent American families who formed the social
elite. The activities and lifestyle of the social elite became exciting conversation fodder for people
outside these exclusive social circles.
The new technologies of radio and movies, both silent and talkies, contributed to the influx of
information received byAmericans. Regular radio broadcasts by the National Broadcast Company
(NBC) and Columbia Broadcast System (CBS) came on the air in the second half of the 1920s. In
opulent new movie theaters, Hollywood movie stars on the “silver screen” showed young men and
women how to drink, smoke, kiss, stand, dress, and dance. Joan Crawford and Rudolph Valentino were
models for aspiring sophisticates.
A traveling couple. The woman wears a summer coat with shawl collar, fastened
asymmetrically at the hipline, with a cloche hat and clutch purse. The man sports a twobutton knicker suit with vest and fedora hat.
But jazz was the key to the 1920s, and became America’s one great contribution to world music.
The distinct sound of jazz—employing syncopation, swung notes, blue notes and improvisation—was
first played by black musicians in New Orleans before spreading to Chicago and Harlem in New York
City. Musicians Duke Ellington and Louis Armstrong and singers Ethel Waters and Bessie Smith were
famous in the jazz world. White musicians incorporated the syncopated sound into popular forms of
music.
George Gershwin wrote many of the 1920s songs that epitomized jazz, including Rhapsody in Blue
and I’ve Got A Crush On You. This music was played by dance bands, recorded on phonograph records
and printed as sheet music. Lyrics reflected the fun feeling of the 1920s with lyrics like “in the
meantime, in between time, ain’t we got fun?”
Jazz music inspired many new dances, such as the Charleston, Black Bottom, Shimmy, Turkey
Trot, Grizzly Bear, Kangaroo Dip and Bunny Hug. Dance partners were closely entwined for many
dances as words in the songs encouraged body contact. Some dances required arms flapping, legs
flying and use of the whole body to accomplish the fast movements. Female dancers were free to
dance with great athleticism.
At private homes, dance clubs, speakeasies and outdoor parties, music and dancing were the main
attractions and demanded radical new styles in clothing for women.
Cartoon drawing of a flapper in a short skirt with bobbed hair, seated in the new slouch
posture with legs crossed, smoking a cigarette.
Where’s there’s smoke there’s fire’, by Russell Patterson, 1920s. The traveling woman on the
cover of this 1928 magazine wears an Art Deco design coat with a large fur collar over a
coordinating belted dress. She has a cloche hat and clutch purse that match a color in the
coat.
WOMEN’S FASHIONS
T
World War I saw young women eagerly adopting a new style of clothing.
Clothes were less confining, simple in cut and meeting the needs of motion required by postwar
activities. From underwear to outerwear, day wear to evening wear, and sportswear to active wear, the
clothing reeked of modern attitudes.
The 1920s silhouette was a tube from shoulder to knee or mid-calf, with the bust flattened, waist
ignored, hips smooth and often fullness below the knee. Greta Garbo, a Hollywood film actress,
became the “look” that the fashionable “flappers” of all classes wanted—flat chested, square
shoulders, narrow hips and long legs. They also adopted Garbo’s relaxed, sophisticated posture called
the “slouch.”
The slouch posture, short hair and pale, defined makeup provided the form for the new clothing
desired by the young women who wanted their dress style to reflect a new way of thinking.
As the American fashion designers were yet to appear, fashion-conscious women continued to look
to Paris for the most current clothing style. Coco Chanel, the most influential clothing designer of this
period, had introduced the new silhouette to modern young women in France beginning in 1913.
Chanel was part of the Parisian circle of high society avant-garde artists, writers and musicians, and
lived the lifestyle that her customers either had or wanted. She became a celebrity designer, and as she
became known in America—seen in magazines in photographs with the rich and famous of Europe—
she fueled interest in the new French fashion. Chanel became the darling of American women and her
designs were eagerly purchased or copied.
Wealthy women often traveled to Paris to purchase wardrobes for the season or to buy specific
garments for special occasions. Others commissioned a private dressmaker to produce garments for
which the client set specifications based on Parisian designs seen in fashion magazines, which
included Vogue and Harper’s Bazaar.
French designs for women’s clothing spread rapidly across the United States. The French fashion
designers sold their designs to select retail stores. The designs were copied by pattern makers and
samples constructed. The copies were shown in New York to buyers for stores around the country then
mass produced to fill the orders. Often the designer allowed the design label, along with the store
label, to be sewn into the garment. The store would then be known for the designer copy they offered.
The Sears, Roebuck & Co. catalog in 1927 offered a winter coat that noted in the advertisement, “This
coat is an exact reproduction of the original model designed by Paul Poiret the famous Parisian
couturier.” Stores prepared a line of copied designs for separate seasons that included spring, summer,
fall, holiday, and often resort. Consequently, American women could purchase designer-label clothing
ready-made in stores such as Neiman Marcus in Dallas; Filene’s in Boston; Bloomingdale’s, Macy’s,
Bonwit Teller, and Lord & Taylor in New York City.
Because there was little need for precise fitting, for the first time department stores could offer
stylish, mass-produced clothing for less wealthy women. These styles were produced by copying
styles based on images published in fashion magazines and newspapers. Department stores offering
less expensive clothing were Marshall Field, Montgomery Ward & Co., and Sears, Roebuck in
Chicago. The mail order catalogs from Sears, Roebuck and Montgomery Ward made the whole
country aware of the new styles. Less expensive mass-produced clothing, based on Paris designs, was
advertised as “NewYork style.”
HE DECADE AFTER
This dress could be worn for afternoon tea or dinner. It is georgette and lace with a georgette
flower and a sash that ties in a generous bow. The lace appears in the deep yoke and cuffs
and in the softly ruffled tiers of the skirt.
Home sewing became more popular among less wealthy women because of the simplicity of
sewing straight, unfitted garments. Paper patterns were available to home sewers and local
dressmakers from several popular companies, including Butterick, Home, Vogue and McCall’s. Their
patterns were shown in magazines produced by pattern companies. In addition, each company made
catalogs of patterns that were available in yard good stores, department stores, and mail-order
companies.
Artificial silk, a man-made fabric known as viscose rayon, was first commercially produced in the
United States in 1910 and by 1924 was called “rayon.” This man-made fabric had the drapability and
sheen of silk, but was less expensive, required less careful care and could be combined with cotton and
wool. Rayon was widely available to both home sewers and manufacturers enabling them to construct
the new fluid dresses without the use of expensive silk. Together, paper patterns, rayon fabric, mass
production of clothing and department stores made the new dress style available to all social levels.
As women wore different clothing for each part of the day, or for a different activity, clothing was
designated as day dress, afternoon dress, day suits, day coats, evening dress, evening coats, sportswear
and lounge wear.
Day dresses were one-piece garments that hung from the shoulders in a straight line past the waist
and hips to the hem. The straight line from shoulder to hem was interrupted by either a seam or
decoration at the hip line. The dress usually had some sort of fullness from the hip to the hem to allow
for walking. Techniques to achieve fullness were flaring the skirt, adding pleats or godets, and
attaching floating panels. These skirt shapes also allowed for ease in getting into automobiles and
dancing.
This McCall pattern sold in 1927 features a one-piece slip-on dress with a lowered curved
neckline and asymmetrical seaming on the bodice and asymmetrical ruffle on the skirt with a
bow at the hip.
Necklines of 1927 shown on this one-piece dress pattern offer both V and square styles. The
skirts have gathering in the front, but are straight in the back.
Most dresses had necklines that hovered around the throat or slightly lower and were round, Vshaped, square, bateau or a cowl that laid flat against the body. Although some dresses appeared
without sleeves, many had cap, above-the-elbow, elbow, and wrist-length sleeves.
Dresses usually had even hemlines, which ranged from mid-calf at the start of the decade to knee
length in the period 1925–28 before falling again to mid-calf. Dress hemlines were the shortest during
the time of The Great Gatsby.
The dress was simple in line without the elaborate seaming or darting used in fitted garments; but
was highly decorated with techniques like quilting, tucking, tiny pleats, gathering, reverse darts and
embroidery. Dresses were decorated with bows, belts, buttons, fabric-covered buttons, ribbons,
artificial flowers, brooches, fringe, feathers and fur. One advertisement showed a dress with a
collarless neckline, chic draped side-panel on the blouse, a deep inverted pleat on the skirt and sashes
with bows.
The day dress on the left has a button collar and cuffs in lace and is trimmed in lace. The
center day dress is two-piece wool with stitched tucks that give the diamond shaping at the
waistline and cuffs. The dress on the right is a two-piece taffeta with dots, white collar, tie,
cuffs and buttons with a pleated skirt.
Afternoon dresses repeated the same silhouette as the day dress, with the same long straight line,
and were usually sleeveless. They extended to mid-calf or ankle in the front and fell to the floor in the
back or had trains of various lengths. This hemline could be irregular like a handkerchief hem, ending
with points extending to the shoe top or trailing on the floor in the back or on either or both sides.
They were made from fabrics including silk, linen, wool, cotton and rayon. These fabrics were either
plain with decoration, or patterned, or a combination of colors and trims. Such dresses were often
worn to afternoon dances.
Advertisement for tubular-style day dresses with a lower calf length, and worn with a large
brim hat, show the style in the years before 1925.