Their Hips Don’t Lie!

Before the beginning of Rococo, classical French court gowns had hoops under their dresses that were fairly circular and created a “bell shaped” silhouette, but around the time of the 1740’s and 50’s, skirt hoops became progressively wider and women tended to abandon the previous lines for a new look- Hip “Panniers”. Panniers were thick padding or hoops made of wire mesh or whalebone that were tied around the waist with string at either side of the hips. The word Panier in French means basket, which reflected the structure of these contraptions, since (especially with the comically large versions) they were sometimes made of metal supports weaved together. These pushed the dress out to the sides only and not to the front or back. This new invention made the trains of these dresses trail elegantly behind the women as they walked. Coincidently, as with most aspects of the fashion of this era, things got a little out of hand. A common width of a fashionable women’s skirt was around ten feet wide, but there were records of opulent gowns with panniers that pushed the skirt out over five yards! How did these women fit through doors? They didn’t. It was not an unusual sight to see women turning sideways just to walk through doorways. Talk about “hip” styles…