The Gendering of Articles of Clothing

• I am a third year English student at the University of Nottingham.
• I am very interested in history and have previously helped with the University’s Vikings for Schools programme.
• I hope to be able to use my passion to contribute to the 3D digitisation of selected objects held by Leicestershire Museum Collections and learn something new!

Across history there have been connections between fashion and queer identity. Because clothing is often strictly gendered it is one of the clearest visual markers of someone deviating from the norm, and society has therefore looked down on any form of deviant fashion for a long time.

Baldesar Castiglione's The Courtier from 1528 discourages men from appearing too feminine: 'I don't want him to appear soft and feminine as so many try to do, when they not only curl their hair and pluck their eyebrows but also preen themselves like the most wanton and dissolute creatures imaginable', he argues (Steele, 2013, p. 81).

'Since Nature has not in fact made them the ladies they want to seem and be, they should be treated not as honest women but as common whores, and be driven out from all gentlemanly society, let alone the Courts of great lords (Steele, 2013, p. 81).

The act of dressing with too much attention to fashion or in a too feminine way is associated with queer desires, suggesting that these men want to become women – and they are reacted to with much the same hatred we still see today. Nonetheless, there have always been subcultures of fashion which have been associated with queer people and enable them to express their identities.

In the eighteenth century, the frequenters of molly houses – establishments somewhere between brothels and inns – were known as mollies and were often queer men and crossdressers. They would take up female names, hold mock marriage ceremonies and wear masquerade dress (Steele, 2013, p. 83).

In the late eighteenth century there was what is called 'The Great Male Renunciation', a period where men’s fashion stepped away from bright colours, decorations, adornments and any other type of excess, deeming such things feminine. There were many reasons for this shift, but one was the effeminacy, and often homosexuality, of stylish men like mollies or macaronis, which threatened conventional ideas of masculinity (Steele, 2013, p. 16).

Macaroni was a fashion subculture commonly linked with homosexuality and androgyny; many caricatures highlighted the sexual ambiguity of the macaroni: 'Is it a man? "Tis hard to say - / A woman then? - A moment pray - / So doubtful is that thing, that no man / Can say if ‘tis a man or woman: / Unknown as yet by sex or feature, / It moves" - a mere amphibious creature' (Steele, 2013, p. 15).

Macaroni dress involved contemporary continental court fashion; tight-sleeved coats, embroidered silks, pastel colours, fashionable patterns and foreign textiles which contrasted the shift to more sombre, practical, dark fashion for menswear (Steele, 2013, p. 91). It became feminine to be fashionable. 

The association between fashionable men and homosexuality continued into the nineteenth century in the forms of the aesthete and the dandy (both typified by Oscar Wilde). Wilde was known for his distinctive style, wearing his hear long and adopting velvet coats, eighteenth century breeches, and flowers, especially green carnations, which became a signifier of homosexuality (Steele, 2013, p. 20).

Clothing was a factor in his famous trial. Descriptions of clothing, including women’s clothing, were considered evidence. Further evidence used against him was the fact that he had bought clothing for a young companion (Steele, 2013, p. 84).

Clothing was not only keenly associated with homosexuality but frequently used to persecute and condemn queer people, highlighting the significance of fashion to queer history.

While female homosexuality has always gone less noticed, lesbians also expressed themselves through subcultures of fashion. In the 1920s the garçonne style, which involved short hair, masculine clothing and a lack of curves, gained popularity (Steele, 2013, pp. 26-27). While men could use corsetry to imitate a female figure, by rejecting corsetry women could create the opposite effect.

Some observers were horrified by the sight of young women 'without breasts, without hips' (Steele, 2013, p. 28). For women, the rejection of elements of fashion, such as shapewear, makeup or shaving, is seen as a rejection of their own gender, since in a patriarchal society women are expected to perform their gender effectively by engaging with fashion. Not only the presence of fashion but also the absence of it can be a significant queer statement.

Homosexual men frequently worked in fashion industries, in jobs such as hairdressers or milliners – because, it was suggested in the eighteenth century, 'they could there both display an interest in such things and have licence to behave with an elegance that verged on effeminacy' (Steele, 2013, p. 103).

This remains a stereotype to this day, and many famous modern fashion designers are gay, such as Alexander McQueen, Christian Dior, Yves Saint-Laurent, and many more (Steele, 2013, p. 7). Queer people are amongst the most significant innovators of fashion.

Clothing created communities for queer people not only through fashion subcultures which allowed them to express themselves, but also through industries in which queer people were able to gain fame and notoriety, and reclaim that which had been used to stereotype and persecute them as something they control. 

Reference

• Steele, Valeries (2023). A Queer History of Fashion: From the Closet to the Catwalk. Yale: Yale University Press.