‘Silk and Steel’: The WWI Museum’s latest exhibit on French fashion and its influence on women’s suffrage

As America recently celebrated the 100th anniversary of the 19th amendment, giving women the right to vote, it’s the perfect time to appreciate how the women’s suffrage movement began — and the renowned World War I Museum has delivered with their latest exhibit, ‘Silk and Steel: French Fashion, Women and WWI.’

The exhibition features French fashion during WWI and how it has developed into the more casual styles we see today. Even if you’re like me, and aren’t a “Devil Wears Prada” fanatic, this exhibit is still runway-worthy in fashion’s role in igniting the women’s suffrage movement. 

The exhibit takes visitors through the span of WWI, as well as pre- and post-war mindsets, explaining how women’s societal roles evolved and how that change stemmed from fashion. While the timeline is thorough in detailing major events in this era of women’s suffrage, such as the first large female-led strike, their use of clothing provides a visual sense of how silk-satin and tulle-filled evening gowns evolved to shorter, beaded-chiffon dresses over the course of the war.

The dresses displayed demonstrate how women’s attire transitioned to simpler, sustainable designs due to a lack of material from war efforts — the most popular of which was the barrel dress. These shorter, less-restricting and wider-at-the-hem dresses paved a way towards women’s clothing being more than just the emphasis on the feminine figure.

The French perspective shown throughout the exhibit signifies how crucial the fashion industry was during WWI, as one-third of the country’s employed population was in the fashion and textile industry. In the exhibit, you learn how household names like Jeanne Lanvin and Gabrielle Chanel introduced simpler designs and brought “leisure-wear” fabrics into everyday style.

Stylistic fashion aside, the true evolution of clothing stemmed from women stepping up in societal roles to fill in for the men at war. While some of those places were fashion houses, hence how Chanel and Lanvin got started, others were far from nice working environments.

Women also had to fill in for the more get-your-hands-dirty jobs, such as factory workers and mechanics. Believe it or not, factories aren’t where you want to parade around in your multi-layered, high-waisted dress — this the French women agreed with.

Before the war, women would never be caught working “unladylike” jobs like these, so there weren’t female work clothes available, forcing women to acclimate to the clothes that men would wear.

For me, the most baffling part of the exhibit was how women were viewed after the war. Men ridiculed women for wearing “masculine” clothing like overalls in fear that they would forget their role in society — a housewife. I’ve heard it before, but no matter how often I’m told of the societal gap between men and women, it still comes as a shock for me.

To be honest, I was expecting more of a historical arc in the post-war remarks in terms of women being seen as more than homemakers, but no. The posters that initially encouraged women to represent their country and contribute to the war efforts were now commanding women to have children to make up for the men they’d lost.

I think the phrase that summed up the exhibit best was, “The war clearly offered no clean break with tradition but should be seen as a period of transition, a shift that presaged revolutions that would take place in the second half of the 20th century.”

From 1914 to 1918, little change occurred in terms of the advancement of French women’s status in society. While U.S. women were granted the right to vote after the war, French women wouldn’t receive this privilege until 1945. However, after the war, more of an emphasis was put on beauty and independence through fashion — the idea that women could do the same as men — opening a gateway to the women’s suffrage movement. 

More than anything, the exhibit reminded me to be grateful for being at the other end of the 100-year timeline — that I could wear jeans and sneakers into a museum and no one would deem me unladylike. And if you want to experience it for yourself, it will remain open until April 11 — I would highly recommend.