Table of Contents

Introduction Buying into Fashion: The Social Background Shopping for Fashion in the Pre-War years Being Chic and Being British The Healthy Body and the Politics of Fitness Evacuation Fashions for a Phoney War Calls for Rationed Fashion Setting the Ration The Utility Clothing Scheme Assessing the Impact of Clothes Rationing Home Front Clothing Initiatives Clothes for Coupons Keep Smiling Through: Good Health and Natural Beauty Utility and Austerity Conclusion Bibliography Index

Promotional Information

From rationed and repurposed fashion to high-end glamour, this accessible book examines the ways in which dress and appearance changed during the Second World War and reflected new attitudes to class, gender and taste.

About the Author

Geraldine Howell taught Theoretical Studies for over twenty years on the Fashion Design course at the University of Westminster, UK and recently became a freelance writer on Dress History.

Reviews

This is not another book about wartime fashion, but a social history of wartime clothing as worn by the civilian population in the UK and the cultural conditions that produced it. As such, it is without equal.
*Textile History*

Readers interested in dress history, or in a more gendered or class analysis of the UK's home front during the Second World War, will find this book well worth their time.
*TRC*

A rigorous, meticulously researched - and fantastically well referenced - text which will make a significant contribution to existing studies on women's dress during wartime Britain.
*Professor Amy de la Haye, Rootstein Hopkins Chair of dress History and Curatorship, London College of Fashion*

BERG TITLES ARE of a more academic bent, so Geraldine Howell's new book may not be for those seeking an introductory guide to the make-do-andmend era. That said, it would still be a highly readable account for the uninitiated - just be aware that it is deemed a 'comprehensive analysis', and that it most certainly is!
*Your Family History*