Clothes and Fashion Polish style - then, now whenever!

Right, I'm going to kick things off with Barbara Hulanicki and Biba. The iconic Biba store in 1960s London lead the way in ultra cool fashions for the beautiful young people :)

"In the summer of 1963, fashion illustrator Barbara Hulanicki established a mail-order company selling affordable fashion appealing to a new generation of young women, which she named Biba. Fashion phenomenon Biba blossomed to become the world's first lifestyle label, sparking a revolution in how people shopped and how Biba earned its spot as the brand that epitomises 1960s and 1970s fashion."

Quite apart from the fashions, the Biba store in Kensington was an extraordinary place. There's been nothing like it before or since. Hats off to Hulanicki!

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How the fak did you dig that one out? I like the chic on left and the one on the right , I like long dresses on women, and, oddly, both don't look old like most PF members
look. The dresses on the far left and far right bring out the boobs , although those models have small boobs, so not that much to see, however, very suitable for Polish women as Polish women have usually big bombs and their boobs would stick out like super baloons.

@wslipach, you must be a real hit with the ladies - you're just such a "charmer"... lol 🥴


I remember watching a documentary about her :)

Both clothes in middle seem mediocre at best and nothing of interest really. Would been secretly horried if a women in my circles bought AND wore them. On right and left seem to be proper lengte, but I am not a fan of dots on dresses and not sure what to say about the dresses armslength either, but passable. Nothing «Wow!» about them tho.

Solo picture further down however reminds of certain fashion during 1920's and looks almost shining without glitter. Clearly best

This is the sad thing. Something like that would be wonderful now.


Why?


What is the 'proper' length? Those photos are probably a couple of years before the miniskirt. Remember, this was very new. Only a few years before, it was a twinset and pearls.


Pure art

This creation and this decor remind me of the painting of Matejko and the pensive Stańczyk.

I dare say, such clothes were super cool in the 1960s.

I wonder myself, since I am quite popular with women. Anyway, whats not charming abt saying fak and talking about boobs? Women love it when men talk about their boobs. And women dont swear? Women look bad when they swear, so don't swear Paulincia and dont talk about dicks and men's butts so much either. You may not do that here, but elsewhere you do. By the way, I am romantic, but to you I will be as least charming as possible.

But this a thread about clothes , Atch show some more, but more sexy ones. throw in what you wear and we will give you a score, honest score. By the way, what collection you wear ? Irish are boring with clothing so I wonder what this Irish chic puts on.

Yeah, that's the kind of look I associate with the 60's.





In PRL:




Until you open your mouth? :D


Are you a Disco Polo fan by any chance? ;D


You're projecting heavily right now LOL

Very much the second half of the decade.

My mum (who never throws clothes away in case they might be useful) finally got around to sorting an old box full of dresses like that, some of them with 'Op Art' and geometric designs, all of them quite fancy due to them coming directly from the fashion houses and being more catwalk than everyday stuff so kept in tissue paper rather than worn. Instead of just going in a bag with the rest to the charity shop, she sold them to a vintage clothes dealer who probably sold them on in London for a fortune.

Sometimes people say that the 60s didn't start until the late 70s and there's some truth in that. Even in the 70s you were more likely to see a beehive hairdo or a big perm than a Twiggy hairdo and people were still wearing patched up clothes from the 1950s.

The four young women in the picture Atch posted look to me to be from 1969-72 (most likely 70-71) but that's American time and there could have been a temporal mismatch.

Those are definitely more 70s colors more muted earthy tones rather than bright mod colors... influenced a little by the hippy look but less busy

I would say so too.

The two maxi dresses suggest that. And they have a country look which suggests later.

My favourite dress is an original 1970s halter neck evening dress from Fenwicks. My mother knew somebody who was a buyer there and used to send us a big parcel of clothes about twice a year. The dress was handed down from my mum to my elder sister and then on to me. I hardly ever get a chance to wear it sadly. Not enough glitzy parties to attend! I'll post a pic of it tomorrow if I can rummage around and find it.

Doesn't look like much in a piccie but it's beautiful in real life. The circles in the middle are diamente and sparkle like 1970s disco balls :)

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I love the colour! I bet it looks stunning on! Simplicity is always smart and in fashion.

I'm personally not big on bling bling but I guess it can make a nice detail.

Of course, a bare back and navy blue, black or red high-heels.

Oh, thanks Lenka! In real life the colour is a deep sapphire blue and the material is silky so it has a lovely lustre. The skirt is very wide and swirly, I suppose designed for dancing :) A nice pair of vintage style silver evening shoes and you're good to go!

Has to be silver :)

Well, yes, because of 'bling bling'.

Let's step back even further to 1868, the year that the Herse fashion house was founded in Warsaw. The Herse family were Huguenots who found refuge in Poland in the 1600s and having settled eventually in Poznań, moved to Warsaw where they founded the Polish version of the House of Dior, fabulously high-end couture fashions. They had a premises in Marszałkowska until the 1936 when sadly, they had to close their doors.

On the four floors of the building at Marszałkowska Street an elegant lady and a gentleman could find everything needed to dress fashionably: modest casual dresses and costumes for walking, traveling, and sports; evening gowns, decked dresses, ball and court gowns; blouses made of batiste, muslin, wool, silk, lace, and knitted; fur coats, fur collars, muffs; fabrics - wool, silk, linen; lingerie: soft petticoats, skirts made of batiste, vests, suits, underwear, and corsets. For men: suits, tuxedos, overcoats, vests, shirts, peaked caps, jackets, neckties: silk, velvet and English ones that can be washed; ruffles, collars: embroidered, plain, and with frills; clothes for children, feather boas, curtains, linen, oriental carpets; accessories: umbrellas, mittens, veils, bags made of scale and silk; fans made of laces and feathers.

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Wow, so that dress is around 50 years old? :O It looks like it's in great condition, like it was bought yesterday!


Thanks for that piece of Polish fashion history - I'm going to read up about them now! :)

That's a nice building, btw (I don't recognise it though 🤔) :)

So men waited until women change from normal day clothing to...same style clothing as lingerie , big excitement

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At my grandma's place, I used to see old Polish fashion magazines, with a very intriguing name - "Uroda".

In Russian, "Urod" (урод), means an ugly person, or a type of moral degenerate.

I don't know why my grandma had to have fashion magazines from a language she could not understand - but I gather there were not many fashion magazines in the USSR.

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:)))


From what Russians/RuSSians told me Poland was a kind of a window to a somewhat freer world, also a window to the West for people living in the Soviet Union. Some of them got to know Polish language in order to be able to read Polish translations of Western books, for example.

As for your grandma, I'm guessing she had them because of the photos of clothes, so she didn't need to know the language for that :)

Sooo ugly in a physical sense or spiritual, moral sense? Or did it mean someone immoral as in someone who exposes their body and in that sense is immoral? Or you have no idea because you are American and Americans are clueless about the world? Your granma ever called you "urod"

Thankfully, no.

In the literal sense - "urod" means an "ugly man". I suppose you could say it about a thing or animal too. Like, «этот Мерс пиздец урод» - "this Mercedes is f*cking ugly".

If you say it about a woman, it's "urodka".

In everyday life it doesn't really mean someone is ugly, but rather that someone is somehow morally deficient. Rude, selfish, deceitful, etc.

The word for beauty is "Krasota".


Absolutely. In another thread, some kind of Kania thread, I already posted about Orda jeans, Pollena cosmetics, and the hilariously named perfumes Być Może!

Gone, Paulina :( replaced by a post-war building.

Time to mention another Barbara, this time Barbara Hoff. She created the Hoffland label

That was our fight for freedom, our fight with the Russification. In the 50s this fight included everything: art, culture, interiors, lifestyle, appearance, politics, everything. That's why I invented this fashion. I thought that fashion could make people more open-minded, that it taught tolerance. And when you become more open to fashion, you become more open to other things.

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