History & culture

A silhouette in which the waist seam of a dress sits at or below the hip rather than the natural waistline, characteristic of the loose, boyish flapper styles of the 1920s.

A skirt cut as a full or partial circle of fabric so it falls in even flares from the waist, popularized with fitted bodices in the New Look-influenced fashions of the 1950s.

British designer and Savile Row-trained tailor known for dramatic, technically complex runway shows and precise tailoring, who led his own label from 1992 and Givenchy from 1996 to 2001.

Cotton fabric with bold, wax-resist-dyed patterns, industrially produced in Europe from the 19th century in imitation of Indonesian batik and adopted as a distinctive West African fashion textile.

A Vietnamese national dress consisting of a long, fitted tunic with side slits worn over loose trousers, developed in its modern form during the 1930s from earlier court dress.

French tailor who patented an early chainstitch sewing machine in 1830 to make army uniforms; rioting tailors, fearing job losses, destroyed his workshop in 1831.

A wax-resist dyeing technique in which molten wax is applied to fabric to block dye from certain areas, producing intricate patterns; long practiced in Indonesia, especially Java, and recognized by UNESCO in 2009.

A method of making a garment, typically a suit, individually from a unique pattern drafted to one client's measurements, involving multiple fittings and largely hand-sewn construction.

Loose trousers gathered at the ankle, worn under a shorter skirt and popularized by Amelia Bloomer in the 1850s as a practical, controversial alternative to restrictive Victorian dress.

A Japanese tradition of patching and mending indigo cotton textiles with layered scraps, born of necessity among rural families from the Edo period into the 20th century and later admired as folk art.

German pattern and fashion magazine founded by Aenne Burda in 1950, distinctive for printing many patterns overlapping on shared sheets; it expanded into an international sewing brand and website.

A framework or padding worn under a skirt to add fullness and projection at the back, fashionable in two main phases during the 1870s and again in the mid-1880s.

One of the oldest home sewing pattern companies, founded in Massachusetts in 1863; it published patterns and the fashion magazine The Delineator, shaping American home dressmaking for over a century.

A plain-woven, often printed cotton cloth named for Calicut, India, imported to Europe from the 17th century and later mass-produced during the Industrial Revolution for everyday clothing.

A jacket-making method in which a layer of horsehair or wool canvas is hand- or machine-stitched inside the front panels to shape the chest, distinct from cheaper fused interfacing.

A stitch formed by looping thread through a previous loop in a continuous chain; quick to sew but prone to unraveling if pulled from the end, it was used in early sewing machines.

English-born designer working in Paris, widely regarded as the father of haute couture; he founded the House of Worth in 1858 and was the first designer to label garments and show seasonal collections.

French designer who founded his fashion house in 1946 and launched the New Look in 1947, reviving fitted bodices and full skirts after wartime fabric rationing.

American designer credited with founding modern American sportswear in the 1930s-40s, pioneering practical, mass-producible separates such as the wrap dress and using humble fabrics like denim and cotton jersey.

French designer who founded her fashion house around 1910 and popularized relaxed, jersey-based women's wear, the little black dress, and the collarless tweed Chanel suit from the 1920s onward.

A machine patented by Eli Whitney in 1794 that mechanically separated cotton fibers from seeds, dramatically increasing cotton production and, in the American South, entrenching slave labor on plantations.

A stiffened or hooped petticoat used to hold out a wide skirt; the cage crinoline of steel hoops, introduced around 1856, replaced heavy layered petticoats and dominated 1860s fashion.

Spanish couturier who opened his Paris house in 1937, renowned for sculptural, architectural silhouettes such as the sack dress and balloon skirt built through precise draping and construction.

American tailor who in 1863 introduced graded, multi-size tissue paper sewing patterns sold to home sewers, founding a company that made dressmaking accessible beyond professional tailors.

American inventor who patented a working lockstitch sewing machine in 1846, using a needle with an eye near its point and a shuttle carrying a second thread.

A dress style with a high waistline gathered just below the bust and a slim, flowing skirt, fashionable in the late 18th and early 19th centuries and named for the Napoleonic era.

A tailoring style developed on Savile Row in the 1920s-30s that adds fullness across the chest and back for ease of movement while maintaining a structured silhouette.

A home sewist's personal accumulated collection of fabric purchased for future projects, a common feature of hobbyist sewing culture often documented and discussed in sewing communities online.

Third-party certification schemes that verify garment supply chains meet standards for fair wages, safe working conditions, and environmental practices, developed largely from the 1990s onward in response to sweatshop scandals.

A hooped or padded understructure worn beneath skirts from the 15th to early 17th centuries to create a rigid conical or wheel-shaped silhouette, first developed in Spain.

A retail business model built on rapidly translating runway and trend ideas into cheap, mass-produced clothing with quick turnaround, expanding globally from the 1990s alongside globalized garment manufacturing.

A soft, loosely woven fabric, traditionally wool and later cotton, brushed to raise a light nap for warmth; associated with Welsh textile production from at least the 17th century.

A loose, straight-cut dress with a dropped waist and hemline typically at or above the knee, worn by young women of the 1920s who embraced a modern, active lifestyle.

A suit-jacket construction in which a floating canvas interlining is sewn, not glued, throughout the front, allowing the jacket to mold to the wearer's body over time.

The traditional dress of Korea, consisting of a short jacket (jeogori) and a high-waisted wrapped skirt (chima) for women, worn historically and today for formal and ceremonial occasions.

A narrow ankle-length skirt so tight at the hem that it restricted the wearer's stride, a controversial fashion of the early 1910s associated with designer Paul Poiret.

An educational movement, formalized in the United States from the 1900s, that taught sewing, garment construction, and household management in schools, shaping generations of home dressmakers.

A skirt held out in a dome or bell shape by a framework of hoops, worn under crinolines and, in earlier colonial and 18th-century forms, related to the farthingale and pannier.

Paris fashion house founded by Charles Frederick Worth in 1858, credited with establishing the couturier as a named creative authority rather than an anonymous dressmaker, dressing European royalty and elites.

A loose, sleeveless tunic woven and embroidered by Indigenous Maya women of Mexico and Central America, with patterns that traditionally signal the wearer's home village and community.