Him And Her

Like much in the fashion world, denim has at times been a bit sexist. For much of their early existence, jeans were something worn exclusively by men. Most early jeans manufacturers didn’t even make clothes with women in mind. The relatively few women who wore jeans had to adapt men’s styles and cuts. For a high fashion perspective, denim was such a low, working class fabric that it was considered too rough to be next to a woman’s delicate skin. Denim was a man’s material.

World War II did a lot to change women’s wardrobes as they took to the floors of assembly lines and machine shops to do the jobs of men who had gone off to fight. The loose skirts and dresses women were accustomed to wearing were inappropriate around heavy exposed machinery. Jeans and its even heavier cousin, denim dungarees, needed to be worn by women and they needed something that would better fit her frame and shape. Slowly, manufacturers took notice and women’s jeans started working their way onto store shelves.