The Age of Nudity

Clothing has always been used as a mark of distinction and has long differed according to gender, age, culture and beliefs. Throughout the years, sumptuary laws were enacted to try to limit the use of fine fabrics and fashionable items to individuals of a certain rank or station in life. Though many Europeans wore similar garments, customs impacted the development of regional styles. While French aristocrats were mandated to be present at the court of Versailles and complied with the formal dress etiquette demanded of them, English nobility was required at court less frequently and lived on their country estates where they favored informal attire suitable for sporting activities such as riding, racing and hunting. English tailors soon became masters at molding the body with woolen cloth that, unlike silk, could be steamed and stretched to shape. They devised new ways to cut cloth that revolutionized male dress and continue to influence fashion today.

One of the first garments modified to fit the athletic body was a country coat called the "frock." To improve fit and reduce bulk for riding, it was cut horizontally at the waist and the front skirt portions were cut away. The male body became better delineated and, as waistcoats lost their basques, the crotch became exposed. Breeches became increasingly tight and molded the thighs and masculine bulge. The impression of nakedness was aided by a light-colored palette and the use of such materials as jersey and buckskin which left little to the imagination. Such humble garments as buckskin breeches were worn by the masses because they were strong, durable and able to conform to the body in motion, and thus were appropriate for physical labor. Worn by natives and colonists on the American continent, buckskin reinforced the link to the natural man, an ideal embraced by French philosophers such as Jean-Jacques Rousseau. By the 1770s, this rugged informal style of dress became so popular that a man could ride into town wearing sports attire, boots and unpowdered hair and be deemed a fashionable dandy. By the 1780s, Anglomania was firmly anchored across the Channel. Although French tailors used silk fabrics and embroidery to adapt the English frock coat to their tastes, the origin of such ordinary garments continued to symbolize a return to nature and democratic ways.

English fashions ruled over France. From his round hard-crown riding hat to his boots with spurs, the French beau of the 1780s reveled in all things British. Fashionable ladies abandoned the robe à la française outside of court and adopted the robe à l'anglaise, characterized by its sewn back pleats and closed-front bodice, and the double-breasted redingote (riding coat) that echoed men's unadorned sporting styles. In the midst of revolution, fashion helped to express allegiance to one's cause and those who wanted change dressed "democratically." Even one's choice of perfume was partisan: as the Ancien Régime favored new floral scents, revolutionaries reverted to musk, the penetrating odor still favored by the people. Ideology ruled fashion and digressions could be fatal. With the French Revolution, the spread of neoclassical fashion was accelerated and tailored British garments began their hegemony over men's wear.