United States Juvenile Suits/Outfits: Chronology--20th Century


Figure 1.-- Here we see three unidentified brothers during the 1910s. The older boys wear double-breasted knickers suits. One boy has a nicktie and another a bow-tie. Their younger brother wearsctriped tunic suits. All the boys wear black long stockings, but we see a mix of low-cut and gigh-top shies. Note the yiunger boys ceb=nter part.

Buster Brown suits and range of other tunic suits become popular after the turn-of-the Century (1900s). After World War I Oliver Twist suits become popular. Tunics were worn throughout the 19th century, but had declined in popularity during the 1880s. he tunics suits worn in the early-20th century were much more widely worn than 19th century boys. They were worn both for play as well as wehen dressing up. As the tunics and Oliver Twist suits didsappear, boys wear even outfits for younger boys become less varied and more standardized. And we begin to see juvenile Eton suits (1920s). These suits became the standard younger boy style. We see boys up to about 10-years of age wearing these Eton suits, but this gradually fell to pre-school ages. They were done with jackets that did not have lapels. While called Eton suits they could be worn with blouses that had Peter Pan as well as Eton collars. This was a style while not unique to America, was mostly seen in America. After the mid-20th century, suits began to go out of style for boys, especially younger boys. We see boys beginning to wear vests when dressing up rathr than suit jackets (1960s). Vests wee a tyle wirn by both younger and oldr boys, even teenagers. This was part of the generalized trend for informality in dress tht begn in the early-20th century. By the late-20th century many boys grew uo rarely wearing suits. Some boys id not even have one.






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Created: 1:09 AM 10/2/2014
Last updated: 2:36 AM 10/2/2014