Wednesday, February 29, 2012

Button Wednesday : Flapper Buttons


It is Wednesday again, so it's BUTTON DAY on my blog !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


A "flapper" was a term applied in the 1920s to a "new breed" of young Western women who wore short skirts, bobbed their hair, listened to jazz, and flaunted their disdain for what was then considered acceptable behavior. Flappers were seen as brash for wearing excessive makeup, drinking, treating sex in a casual manner, smoking, driving automobiles and otherwise flouting social and sexual norms (Wikipedia).

So, what do flappers have to do with buttons ?

Flapper dresses were straight and loose, leaving the arms bare (sometimes no straps at all) and dropping the waistline to the hips. Silk or rayon stockings were held up by garters. Skirts rose to just below the knee by 1927, allowing flashes of leg to be seen when a girl danced or walked through a breeze, although the way they danced made any long loose skirt flap up to show their legs. So, they often wore flirty buttons attached to their garters. Such buttons had often flapper faces like the famous cartoon character Betty Boop.

I found some old and new Flapper Buttons; so here we go.













red flapper button

(Pictures are from LuLu's Vintage (2x), Helen Morgan, Christina Bachman from buttonfun, Habadash, Adam Venture, and McArt)



Have you seen a lovely, beautiful, stunning, crazy button or button-related thingy, or did you make something with a button / buttons, or did you even make buttons yourself, blog about it on your blog on Wednesday, and give the link here in the comments so that everybody can enjoy it !!

7 comments:

Stephanie Kilgast said...

oooh! such cute buttons :D

Bitesfromthesun said...

I love them!!

HEra said...

Love it! Fantastic button girls!

Unknown said...

So cute.
Love them

Joanne said...

Really interesting piece of history and such cute buttons!

Nauli said...

Great finds! The really make us smile.

Unknown said...

These are so nice. Like it!