The Culture of Fashion. Christopher Breward

THE CULTURE OF FASHION by Christopher Breward 

This major new illustrated survey of 600 years of fashion investigates its cultural and social meanings from medeval Europe to twentierth-entury America.Beward's groundbreaking work provides the reader with a clear guide to the changes in style and taste and shows that clothes have always played a pivotal role in refining a sense of identity and society, especially when concerned with sexual and body politics.

Using a chronigical structure, each chapter focuses on both male and female fashion of a specific period. The book includes discussions of androgynous dressing, fabrics, clothing and the rise of city life, dress and the changing shape of the human body, controversies surrounding trousers and leg wear for both men and women, exposure of flesh, fashion and social status and the dissemination of fashion through travel, film, magazines and catwalk shows.

A paperback published by Manchester Univesity Press