Getting your directoire gusset in a twist

I wore these for a while in the 60's. It was a cold winter and they were fashionable.

Standards (and trousers) are slipping!

The male assistant in John Lewis this morning was showing builders' bum. In John Lewis!!

As in `JANE` of the Daily Mirror Elegran perfoming on theatre stages in the 1940s that`s where I fell in love with `advanced age` ladies.Those were the days......

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Jess They were very good at swishing the skirts around showing not-a-lot so that the audience were roaring for more - then finished by bending over with the back turned and skirts flipped back and up. Cue even more roars, and curtain falls.

A bit like the fan dancers who could keep the feathers over the naughty bits while staying (relatively) decent.

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One of them seems to have a paint-roller in their hand as well....multi-tasking!

It's a builder's bum, isn't it?

Didn't know women could work in the construction industry in those days

Oh my goodness! What's happening here

(villa de casale)

oh elegran was it? Gosh, in my innocence that never occurred to me.

Breast binders have been universal for comfort.

Do we assume that those Roman women went about in Britain with their boobs on show, or was it that those who made the British mosaics just hankering after warmer climes?

My Gran wore directoire knickers in either white or pink silk, she died in 1968 but I got the impression she had been wearing them since she was a young woman. I bet they were quite comfortable to wear.

Google 'villa de casale' in Sicily.

No! Women the top half went round their breasts. I think some of the British mosaics show them as well.

Galen Wasn't that just the chaps?

And, of course, the cancan was notorious because of the lack of knickers.

We need that vicar's wife to enlighten us - fill in the gaps as it were.

When a pair of knickers were two separate legs the gaps must have been draughty.

My grandma wore directoire knickers with a kite gusset - a concept I found very puzzling as a child.

Romans wore knickers, there are a pair of leather ones in the museum of London.
If you look at mosaics,you can see what look like bikinis worn by some athletes.

Bloomers = two capacious legs. Thongs = one tight gusset. Only a bloke can say which is sexier. (Prefer Sloggis and comfort myself.)

I understood that knickers came into being with the fashion for hooped crinolines. Ladies needed something to cover their modesty if the whole thing tipped or was blown up. No problem with twisted gussets though - they didn't have a gusset. Just two legs. Thus a pair.

No, don't!!!

Ariadne Funny you should say that. No sooner had I posted than I started wondering about underwear in ancient Rome. I think when knickers were first around they were regarded as garments worn only by women of easy virtue. Given how capacious they were, that is further evidence that concealment is far more titillating than exposure.

Sexual arousal – bloomers versus thongs. Discuss.