1920s Jazz Age Fashion and Photographs celebrates haute couture, ready-to-wear, and mass market fashion in America, Britain, and France from 1919 to 1929, with an in-depth focus on women's clothing. Illustrated with specially commissioned photography, including one hundred and fifty color images, the book brings together leading experts to examine fashion's role in the social, political, and cultural influences of the period.
Characterized by exuberance and optimism, the Jazz Age was a symptom of the end of the First World War and the birth of America as a new world power. It was a period of unprecedented social change for women who were, for the first time in history, given the vote on a par with men. A new "boyish" silhouette, la garçonne, became the look for women of the twenties. This decade also saw innovations in textile technology, with the introduction of the artificial silk Rayon and the zipper contributing to an easier approach to fashionable dress.