In this now highly entertaining video from the 1930s, ‘top US fashion designers’ (unnamed) had been asked to design what they felt the woman of the year 2000 would be wearing. The resulting designs included predicting the end of the skirt, that we might wear floaty trousers with electric belts to regulate temperature, that wedding dresses might take on a rather meringue-esque appearance and (my personal favourite) that ladies might carry a handy but beautiful torch to wear as part of an ensemble within their hairdo.
I was particularly taken with the first costume on offer – a dress that could be adapted for wear in the mornings, afternoons and evenings too, just by adapting it’s component parts and accessorising. We don’t change perhaps quite as often today, but it reminded me that my grandmother always changed into a new outfit for the afternoon, as a matter of course. Really, just as we might today get changed from work clothes into civvies. It seemed strange to me as a child that she put on a new dress after lunch, as my Mum and I didn’t do this, but it was part of Myrtle‘s everyday routine, and she didn’t ever do any differently.
The thing that makes this video really stand out for me is that there are some intruguingly accurate predictions in the film regarding technology. The token male costume included a portable telephone and radio, albeit in an rather fetching Adam-West-esque utility belt combo and there was also talk of living in a climate controlled environment, so perhaps we will be wearing electric belts yet.