Why did the women use to cover their bodies before 1920?

[buritobr]

During many centuries until 1920, women used to show only their necks and their heads. They used to wear long skirts/dresses.
Between 1920 and 1960, the skirts got shorter and longer, shorter and longer. Finally, since 1960, women can choose: wear long skirts, mid-length skirts, short skirts or pants.
Why couldn't the women show more parts of their bodies before 1920? What happened in the 1920s that allowed the changes in the dress code?

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

World War I

Yes, it's simplistic, but the combination of women, albeit temporarily, entering the work force, a lack of young men due to the War, and war-time conservation measures leading to the end of the steel-ribbed corset once and for all, those were all major factors.

[dead0man]

Did they cover more of their bodies than men did at the time?  Maybe the sides of their faces were covered a bit more than men's, but both sexes seemed to be covered head to toe with one item of clothing or another.

and is all the cleavage at the Renn Faire as historically inaccurate as most everything else there?

[buritobr]

But what is the relation between the end of the corset and the decrease of the length of the skirts? It is possible to wear a long skirt without wearing corset.

[World politics is up Schmitt creek]

and is all the cleavage at the Renn Faire as historically inaccurate as most everything else there?

There was quite a bit of décolletage in many medieval and Renaissance styles, and outright bared breasts in some periods and places, but when present such fashions tended to involve square necklines.

[dead0man]

and is all the cleavage at the Renn Faire as historically inaccurate as most everything else there?

There was quite a bit of décolletage in many medieval and Renaissance styles, and outright bared breasts in some periods and places, but when present such fashions tended to involve square necklines.

Was it just an upper class western European thing, or did farmers wives wear low cut necklines too?  I would assume it just varied a lot from place to place and time to time like fashions tend to do.  Probably perfectly good reasons that we could figure out sometimes.  But probably most of the time just one Princess in Lombard deciding that her coming out dress should highlight her ample bosom and looks nothing like the one her mom wanted her to wear and her peers deciding that it looks good....all the hot young Princes* seem to enjoy them...I mean it.


*did I do that right?  The plural of Prince is Princes...yes....and looking it up made me discover (probably again) the double plural.  Language is weird.

[Stranger in a strange land]

and is all the cleavage at the Renn Faire as historically inaccurate as most everything else there?

There was quite a bit of décolletage in many medieval and Renaissance styles, and outright bared breasts in some periods and places, but when present such fashions tended to involve square necklines.

For some reason everyone assumes that for the entire history of Western Civilization from roughly the Fall of the Roman Empire up until the 1920s or so, it was just as prude as it had been during Victorian Times, which of course was not the case.

[World politics is up Schmitt creek]

and is all the cleavage at the Renn Faire as historically inaccurate as most everything else there?

There was quite a bit of décolletage in many medieval and Renaissance styles, and outright bared breasts in some periods and places, but when present such fashions tended to involve square necklines.

For some reason everyone assumes that for the entire history of Western Civilization from roughly the Fall of the Roman Empire up until the 1920s or so, it was just as prude as it had been during Victorian Times, which of course was not the case.

To be clear, it wasn't necessarily indicative of 'sexual liberation' or whatever in these times and places that décolletage and toplessness showed up, because breasts weren't seen as sexual until I think some time in the eighteenth century. Definitely the Early Modern period. (According to a religious scholar called Sarah Jane Boss the process started when depictions of a bare-breasted nursing Mary fell out of style.)

[DC Al Fine]

Did they cover more of their bodies than men did at the time?  Maybe the sides of their faces were covered a bit more than men's, but both sexes seemed to be covered head to toe with one item of clothing or another.

Here's an Edwardian photo from 1905



Seems pretty even to me.

[Del Tachi]

The rise of the automobile/industrial machinery was also a contributing factor.

Wearing ungodly amounts of material while getting in and out of car/working on an industrial machine is a recipe for disaster.