Escape to Better Times

Beautiful Eyes

As requested by @storystereo

In the 1920′s women’s fashion changed radically. The war is over and there’s a relative feeling of times only getting better. The classic idea of having long hair is gone and society gets more looser and acceptable.

It must be noted that cutting the hair all short wasn’t done by everyone, coming from the long Edwardian looks, cutting of all of it wasn’t an easy decision. Many women cut their hair shoulder length. The bob is the most stylish hairdo, faking it was normal. Wild curls and hairpins were a woman’s best friend.

Women with naturally straight hair and an even more wilde spirit cut their hair short and banned the curls. 

Art nouveau and Art Déco inspired accessoires like the headbands still exist, but wearing large hats is very out of style. Small hats are the way to go in the roaring twenties. Finger waves already existed before the war and are still an acceptable style.

Here are some cool gals looking mighty dapper! You can click on each photo for names and here’s some info on each fabulous woman:

Lily Elsie: English actress during Edwardian era, famous for being in many musicals and operettas

Josephine Baker: French bisexual actress, singer, and dancer who rose to prominence in the 1920s, refused to perform for segregated audiences, active with the French Resistance during WWII and the Civil Rights movement in the 50s

Dorothy Arzner: American lesbian film director who was the only female director in Hollywood during the 1930s, created the first boom mike for the Clara Bow film “The Wild Party” (1929)

Dorothy Mackaill: British-American actress who was involved in the Ziegfeld Follies, also notable for her silent-film roles

Daphne du Maurier: English bisexual author and playwright, famous for her works like Rebecca and “The Birds”

Frida Kahlo: Mexican bisexual painter, known for the feminist and nationalist themes in her paintings, created 55 self-portraits and once stated “I paint myself because I am so often alone and because I am the subject I know best.”

Hannah Gluckstein, known as “Gluck”: British lesbian artist known for her evocative Modernist paintings, adopted the name “Gluck” because she thought the sex of a painter is irrelevant

Olive Thomas: American silent-film actress, involved in the Ziegfeld Follies, possibly the first “Vargas Girl” after posing for pinup artist Alberto Vargas

Jessie Matthews: English actress, singer, and dancer who rose to prominence in the 1920s and 30s

Sarah Bernhardt, a French stage actress known for playing male roles in the 1870s and 80s. Played the lead role in the opera Princess Fedora, during which she wore a hat with a soft brim and a crase in the center. This hat later became fashionable among women and even became a symbol of women’s liberation until Edward Prince of Wales started wearing it in 1924, and then it became part of men’s fashion.

So, the headwear now associated with emotionally insecure white men started out as a symbol of feminism until a man came along and co-opted it.