18th century corsets are the corset of the 12 months 2024 – just ask Taylor Swift or Anne Hathaway

During the performance of the Tortured Poets Department performance of her Eras Tour in Paris in May 2024, Taylor Swift appeared in a custom White dress by Vivienne Westwood. It featured a fitted bodice and flowing, draped skirts with lyrics from her single “Fortnight” scrawled across them.

While the text have caught the eye of Swifties across the web. As an authority on Georgian fashion, I used to be intrigued by the fitted bodice – a design often called a corset within the 18th century. That corsets proceed to be at the guts of fashion is a testament to the persistence of 18th century trends.

Since the Bridgerton effect first took hold in late 2020, fitted, corset-like tops have continued to be in style. These corset tops are inspired not by the hourglass cut of Nineteenth-century corsets, but by the structural underwear of the 18th century.

They have appeared in fashion shows and campaigns, including Anne Hathaway for Versaceworn by celebrities resembling Emily Bluntsold by well-known brands and reproduced by historical clothing enthusiasts and independent manufacturers on Etsy and Ebay.

“Corselets” was the term for corsets within the 18th century. They were produced from as much as five layers of material, including buckram and linen, and covered with wool or silk. They were produced from baleen, higher often called whalebone: the pliable and absorbent keratin plates from the upper palate of a whale. Whalebone is as pliable as a fingernail, absorbs moisture and conforms to the body.

Like a supportive hug, corsets provided unbelievable support for the chest and lower back, gently and comfortably shaping a lady's upper body into the conical shape that defined the 18th century silhouette.

The optical illusion of a narrower waist was not created by tight lacing, but by adding volume to the hips with hoops or panniers (side rings). No broken ribs or crushed organs – just great posture and Wonder Bra-level cleavage.

In practical terms, the support of the chest and back was helpful for girls who did physical work, for girls from more distinguished backgrounds who did domestic work, and for girls within the upper classes who needed to stand for hours at court functions. Functionally, the dresses weren’t buttoned, laced or zipped (zippers didn’t exist until the Nineteenth century), but pinned in place. Pins attached the material of the dress to the corsets and thus protected the body.

All women in Georgian society wore corsets, not only the elite. Wealthier women bought corsets made to measure by corset makers. They were also available second-hand, and cheaper versions were produced from reed or corrugated leather. Some women even went to this point as to steal their corsets to realize the coveted figure.

Women's morality relied on wearing a bodice. The recognizable shape created by the structured undergarment was explicitly linked to women's moral and social standing, much like the Nineteenth century concept that “cleanliness was close to piety.” Women with out a bodice were considered slovenly, mentally deranged, criminal, or bad repute. Wearing a corset meant that a lady could take part in 18th century society. It was a modern sign that she was neither penniless nor crazy nor willing to sell sex for money.

The corset was worn throughout life. lighter version were worn by children from infancy onwards, in the assumption that an upright posture protected them from airborne diseases. And they may very well be modified and added to as the lady's body modified, even during pregnancyThey were considered a basic necessity for all times within the 18th century.

Modern stays

Corsets inspired by the 18th century were first revived in contemporary fashion by Vivienne Westwood in her Statue of Liberty of 1988 and 1990 portrait collections. Westwood, whose thoughtful and progressive use of historical pattern-making and manufacturing techniques was considered one of the pioneers of the underwear-as-outerwear trend.

Historical underwear was rediscovered as subversive, sexy and rebellious. On the heels of the punk aesthetic, wearing historically inspired underwear product of Lycra and plastic boning as outerwear challenged the style of clothing that society considered appropriately dressed.

Ironically, the garment that defined a lady as morally appropriate in 18th century society was turned on its head within the late twentieth century to defy those self same definitions.

The underwear-as-outerwear trend of the 2020s is widespreada often used motif of the dressmaker that is not any longer only related to more subversive subcultures or fashion niches.

Its ongoing resurgence today – most recently within the Spring-Summer 2024 collections of Westwood, Galliano for Maison Margiela And Gaultier for Simone Rochaand by fashion figureheads in popular culture like Taylor Swift—suggests it's not going away anytime soon. Could 18th-century-inspired corset tops develop into as ubiquitous as corsets once were? Probably not, but their revival would serve the hunched posture of our screen-obsessed society admirably.