Pink Panache

[Pleater]

I just finished a rush order for a tank top - in pink - well, he wanted the magenta colour that T Mobile uses - it is for some advertising scheme, - but there was no time for anything but what I had so he got rose pink washed with some blue dye.

Pink is very fashionable at the moment - and it used to be a masculine colour - hunting pink - being 'in the pink' - and any very old pink dress was most likely to be for a boy. My father - born 1918, was in gowns and dresses for the first couple of years of his life until 'breeched' when he was thought old enough to manage to get in and out of shorts by himself.

Some shades of blue were formerly considered to be only apt for girls.

I suspect that it is only in the last hundred or so years that pink for a girl and blue for a boy has become the norm - a hot pink is a reallly vicious colour - I am sensitive to colours - and making the tank top has really got on my nerves. Blue is so sweet and soothing in the lighter shades.

I was trying to think of what a man should wear with a pink kilt - but somehow all I could visualise was a hopeful grin and a bottle of something alcoholic with - probably - bubbles.

Trying really hard results in boots, hat and waistcoat in pale grey sheepskin, with the edges folded back to show the wool.

Somehow I don't think a pink kilt fits in with much contained in many a modern man's wardrobe. It will be interesting to see the end result in all its glory. From a little distance. Close up might be too much for my over pinked nerves, but a view of a Pink Panache in his natural setting might not scrawnch them too much.

[Nanook]

Pink is very fashionable at the moment - and it used to be a masculine colour - hunting pink - being 'in the pink' - and any very old pink dress was most likely to be for a boy.

The start of the female gendering of pink (and exclusion from the male wardrobe) in America and parts of Europe is no earlier than the 1940s or 1950s. Its, however, accepted as a predominantly male colour in many countries including parts of the Commonwealth. Pink, for example, has long been a very popular colour in Bermuda for shorts (which, not unlike the kilt, are worn with sports coat and knee socks). It is considered a formal and not leisure colour (a range of prints). Bermuda shorts are business and formal attire. They are, like the kilt, a national dress. Bermuda shorts too are considered exclusively male garments. Both evolved from British military uniforms (many of our notions and styles for kilts can be traced to the army). The female counterpart (not considered proper business dress for women) are longer (knee length) and narrow-cut.

[string]

The start of the female gendering of pink (and exclusion from the male wardrobe) in America and parts of Europe is no earlier than the 1940s or 1950s.

String gets her history geek on
Actually I would trace it back to Gainsborough's paintings Pinky and Blue Boy in the 1790s. They were very controversial because he reversed the children's color roles. It started a fashion of dressing children in those colors among the "artsy" crowd. For adults however, there were very little distinction among masculine and feminine colors and fabrics during the 18th and 19th century.

However, that is the extent of what I know on that particular culture and costuming history question. Personally, I despise pink and have refused to wear it since I was 5.

[Bugbear]

Pink is fine for male clothing. However, you have to go by your color types, like the season skin type. Some people should stay away from pink at all cost.[QUOTE=string;457496]

The start of the female gendering of pink (and exclusion from the male wardrobe) in America and parts of Europe is no earlier than the 1940s or 1950s. /QUOTE]

String gets her history geek on
Actually I would trace it back to Gainsborough's paintings Pinky and Blue Boy in the 1790s. They were very controversial because he reversed the children's color roles. It started a fashion of dressing children in those colors among the "artsy" crowd. For adults however, there were very little distinction among masculine and feminine colors and fabrics during the 18th and 19th century.

However, that is the extent of what I know on that particular culture and costuming history question. Personally, I despise pink and have refused to wear it since I was 5.