TIME: Almanac 1993/TIME Almanac 1993.iso/time/caps/60s/60fashio

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                -z                                                          Fashion & Fun


  [Americans opened their closets to the fashions that have come
to symbolize the 1960s.]


(July 19, 1963)

  The chemise family is a closely knit group. Fashion-conscious
females who climbed out of the sack only a short while ago now
find themselves climbing right back into the sack's first
cousin, the shift. Already a slender trend as winter waned, the
shift really switched into high with the summer solstice. On
beaches from Maine to Malibu, Iissome Loreleis clad in the
latest two-piece bathing suits arranged themselves across the
sand, apparently to ponder such girth-shaking questions as: How
is a girl going to look her best when she isn't looking her
barest? Thus, in a blinding flash, came the shift to shifts,
biggest cover story in beachwear this season.


(January 3, 1964)

  The galosh has gone galumphing into oblivion, and in its place
is the musketeer boot, the Robin Hood boot, the cossack boot,
lined, unlined, fur-topped, made of fake leopard or silk faille
or nylon mesh or even real leather. Office girls wear them to
work at the slightest sign of inclement weather, carrying their
shoes in a tote bag (the smarter ones keep a pair of shoes in
their desk). For the evening, slippers are carried in jeweled
reticules.

  A special favorite is the high-heeled, calf-topping black
leather model with the rakish, lady-lion-tamer look.


(June 26, 1964)

  Rudi Gernreich was bored to tears with necklines. The V neck,
the scoop neck, the boat neck, the turtle neck, the square neck,
even the deep-cup plunge, all seemed drags. But the California
designer is an all-action-no-talk man, and in no time at all he
had pulled himself together and come up with a rather refreshing
idea; drop a neckline low enough, say to the waist. Then it
actually won't be a neckline at all, and no one will be even the
least bit bored.

  Rudi was right as rain. His topless bathing suit (designed as
"a prediction of things to come") was first modeled in the flesh
for buyers early this month, drew S.R.O. crowds and, of course,
caused raging controversy.


(April 9, 1965)

  Recently imported from Paris, the short, short skirt has been
gleefully adopted by the avant-grade among U.S. teen-agers and
coeds as the perfect complement to patterned stockings and
leather boots--usually white. From San Francisco coffeehouses
to Manhattan discotheques, girls are beginning to reveal more
thigh than they have stocking to cover, and American males are
scrambling for the best vantage point.

  The man who did most to open up the vistas of "vastus
lateralis" is Andre Courreges, 41, the brightest new star in the
Paris firmament.

  This February his pencil-thin mannequins popped out in severe
white dresses cut three inches above the knee and white,
mid-calf boots open at the toe. The French Vogue and Elle
devoted so much space to Courreges that Coco Chanel took
offense.

  Ridiculous or not, knees and the lower thigh are now in the
public eye. For still supple gamines who can toss off a
handstand or a cartwheel, the new look will fit like an old
glove. But for those who cannot resist layer cake and ice cream,
Courreges may take more courage than they've got.


(March 1, 1968)

  Ever since the demise of the grey flannel suit in the early
1950s, a revolution in menswear has been forecast as regularly
as the lifetime light bulb or a new Nixon. Until lately, men's
fashion changes have added up to little more than slimmer
trousers, side vents, a return of the shaped, double-breasted
suit, and frilled shirts--worn mainly by actors. Lately,
however, there have been signs of a real change in attitude.

  Current symbol of the freer male attitude is the turtleneck
pullover now being worn by just about everybody from Lyndon
Johnson, who fancies the comfort of turtlenecks for travel
aboard Air Force One, to the Duke of Windsor, who slips into one
for small, informal dinner parties. Those who feel that tuxedos
are old-fashioned are trying out the long, mandarin-collared Mao
or Nehru coats. In Los Angeles last week, TV's Tonight Show Host
Johnny Carson marched on-camera sporting American Designer Oleg
Cassini's version of the Mao in dark blue whipcord.


  [Americans discovered a new ways to spend their leisure time.]

(February 23, 1962)

  Skiing is probably the fastest-growing recreation on earth.
In the U.S. alone, 30 new areas have been opened this year,
ranging from Sierra Blanca in New Mexico to Stratton Mountain
in Vermont, where a giant lodge and twelve slopes and trails
have been built at a cost of more than $1,000,000. And the
invention of snowmaking machines has brought skiing even to such
stately summering places as Virginia's Homestead hotel. At
Cataloochee Ranch in North Carolina, man-made snow brings skiers
from as far away as St. Petersburg, Fla.

  An even newer trend is the skiing vacation in Europe. A skier
who catches Alitalia's 8 p.m. Flight 603 at Idlewild Airport on
Friday is in Milan Saturday morning at 9:20, ready to jump into
a rented Fiat for the drive to Cervinia. At noon, he is
schussbooming down a 6,500-ft. Alp.


(August 9, 1963)

  Bleached-blond Boy with bangs meets beach-bound Girl with
bikini. They stow their surfboards in his "woodie" (a vintage
paneled station wagon) and take off for Malibu. En route, a
transistor radio beats out the tune that has been topping the
charts, Jan and Dean's Surf City:

  They say they never roll the streets up   'Cause there's
always something going...   You know they're either out surfing
 Or they got a party growing!

  Like skiing, surfing was until recently the private passion
of a few bronzed dare-devils. But in the past few years, surfing
has become something like a way of life for thousands of
devotees all along the Southern California coast. Every weekend
an estimated 100,000 surfers paddle into the briny on 7-ft. to
12-ft. balsa or polyurethane boards, struggle upright into a
precarious balance with nature, and try to catch the big
breakers coming in.


(March 20, 1964)

  The most fashionable dancing these days is done at a
"discotheque," which is really nothing but a highbrow version
of a juke joint plus a disk jockey. But this simple formula and
the dancing that goes with it is giving international night life
its newest sights and sounds.

  The Twist, nowadays, is for squares. In its place is an
open-ended series of variations on the theme "stay put." The
pelvis gets all the play in the Frug, twitching sexily from side
to side while the hands make slow and sensuous gestures. The
Wobble is a group dance like the Hully Gully, with charade-style
steps and gestures such as the Push, the Frankenstein, the
Popeye and the Barrel.


(February 17, 1967)

  Even for today's liberated career woman, walking into a bar
and ordering a drink on her own still borders on indiscretion,
or at least embarrassment. But there is one kind of saloon where
the post-college girl in her 20s enters without
trepidation--although having a roommate along helps. This is the
fast-growing institution known as the "dating bar," which
deliberately seeks the patronage of single males and females by
providing the ambiance of a cocktail party mixed with the
nostalgic roar of a fraternity blast.

  The decor usually runs to dark panelling, Tiffany lamps and
sawdust floors, the entertainment to jukeboxes stocked with the
latest rock 'n' roll hits. Signs sometimes read: "Age Limit: 24
for Men, 21 for Women." Once the word is passed by the
powder-room tom-toms that a particular hangout has become "a
nice place to meet people," the rush is on.


(March 1, 1968)

  Though Northglenn will be the Denver area's fourth major new
shopping center in two years, that splurge only symbolizes the
vast change that has overtaken retailing. In the past ten years
the number of shopping centers in the U.S. and Canada has
quadrupled to 10,900. Last year they accounted for an estimated
39% of retail sales.

  By combining glamour and one-stop convenience, the shopping
centers have become the focus not only of retailing activity but
of much community culture and recreational life. In addition to
restaurants, banks, a post office, movie theaters, skating rinks
and often a free auditorium for club meetings or amateur plays,
the centers entice auto-borne families with a busy schedule of
attractions. There are fashion shows and symphony concerts,
pumpkin judging contests and senior proms, reptile-club snake
exhibits and "petting zoos" (for animals tame enough for tots
to touch).

  Much of that country-fair atmosphere originated with the
trend toward enclosed, generally glass-roofed malls. Inside,
developers plant tropical gardens dotted with benches, fountains
and even aviaries. New Jersey's Delaware Township even changed
its name to Cherry Hill, after that of its shopping center,
whose verdant mall draws sightseers and customers from cities
100 miles away.