The History of Ladies Trousers
Today, women wearing trousers is a common sight. However, this phenomenon has actually occurred very recently in our history.
Even today, there are still a few parts of the world where the wearing of trousers by woman is banned. This is a fact, which surprises many young women. However, women in their 70s and 80s can still remember a time when women in the West did not wear trousers.
Ladies Trousers in Victorian times
In the West, perhaps the first time women started to wear trousers was during Victorian times. However, it was extremely rare even then. At that time, the French were the trailblazers. Even they only wore them when riding a bicycle for this reason they were known as riding trousers. Gradually women began to wear britches when they rode horses, but again this was a trend that took time to grow. There is also some evidence that women in the US were wearing trousers to ride when they worked on ranches in the mid-1800s. In 1893, Wigan pit brow girls who pushed the coal drams were pictured wearing trousers, which shocked Victorian society. This was despite the fact that they wore skirts over their trousers.
Ladies Trousers and World War II
However, in most parts of the world it was not until the dawn of World War II that women began to wear trousers on an almost daily basis. Then they did it for purely practical reasons. Many women had to take on heavy manual roles for which the wearing skirts was dangerous and impractical. As a result, the vast majority of them chose to wear overalls or their husband’s trousers.
Interestingly, the only other examples of women wearing trousers prior to this point were ancient Amazonian women who were soldiers.
After the war, women wearing trousers in public slowly but surely became acceptable. Today, millions of long ladies trousers are sold across the globe. Some women rarely if ever wear skirts and they are acceptable in all but a few settings in the Western world and much of the rest of the world.
For a great selection of high quality, modern long ladies trousers come to the Viyella website.
Processing your request, Please wait....
