Flapper Fashion Of The Jazz Age 32 Eye Popping Photos

Flapper fashion meant embracing your freedom from constrictive corsetry and flaunting the luxurious designs of the Jazz Age.

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1 of 33A flapper hangs a poster to advertise the Greenwich Village Halloween Ball. Date unspecified.Bettmann/Getty Images 2 of 33Actor James Hall playing marbles on the film lot with colleagues Louise Brooks, Nancy Phillips, Doris Hill, and Josephine Dunn. Date unspecified.Hulton Archive/Getty Images 3 of 33Norma Talmadge plays an Austrian girl in the film The Woman Disputed. 1928.Hulton Archive/Getty Images 4 of 33Colleen Moore, star of the silent screen. 1929.Margaret Chute/Getty Images 5 of 33Louise Brooks. 1927.Wikimedia Commons 6 of 33Actress Louise Brooks with her famous bobbed hairstyle. 1929.John Kobal Foundation/Getty Images 7 of 33Actress Lupe Velez bracing her hands on two low counters in Chicago, Illinois. 1929. Chicago History Museum/Getty Images 8 of 33American actresses Kathleen Clifford and Betty Compson stage a mock fight with their fur stoles. 1920.FPG/Getty Images 9 of 33Canadian actress Marie Prevost. 1920. APIC/Getty Images 10 of 33American actress Marion Davies. Date unspecified.Apic/Getty Images 11 of 33Actress Mary Brian in costume as a cigarette girl. 1928.Eugene Robert Richee/Margaret Chute/Getty Images 12 of 33Actress Mary Nolan as she appeared in Shanghai Lady in typical flapper fashion. Circa 1929.Bettmann/Getty Images 13 of 33Girl in flapper garb. Moscow, Idaho. 1922.Wikimedia Commons 14 of 33Canadian-born actress Norma Shearer. 1928.Margaret Chute/Getty Images 15 of 33Norma Shearer. Date unspecified.Wikimedia Commons 16 of 33Hollywood film star Clara Bow in a shiny strapless dress. 1926.Eugene Robert Richee/John Kobal Foundation/Getty Image 17 of 33Hollywood actress Evelyn Brent with her collection of shoes. 1925.C. E. Day/Margaret Chute/Getty Images 18 of 33Swimming suit-clad flapper strikes a pose on a breakwater. 1925. Kirn Vintage Stock/Corbis via Getty Images 19 of 33Actress Dorothy Mackaill stars in the film The Whip. 1928.Hulton Archive/Getty Images 20 of 33American actress Viola Dana. 1924. APIC/Getty Images 21 of 33A flapper plays her banjo in the front yard. 1925. Kirn Vintage Stock/Corbis via Getty Images 22 of 33Actress Alice White. 1929.Hulton Archive/Getty Images 23 of 33Anita Page wearing a slinky dress and a sultry smile. 1928.General Photographic Agency/Getty Images 24 of 33Singer, dancer and entertainer Josephine Baker wearing a dress decorated with feathers. 1930. General Photographic Agency/Getty Images 25 of 33Gabrielle Chanel, known as Coco, the French couturier. 1932.Evening Standard/Getty Images 26 of 33Hollywood film star Dorothy Sebastian checks the time on a small jade watch worn on a gold and jade chain around her neck. 1925. Clarence Sinclair Bull/Hulton Archive/Getty Images 27 of 33Canadian actress Fay Wray. 1925.Silver Screen Collection/Getty Images 28 of 33A flapper poses with her car. 1925. Kirn Vintage Stock/Corbis via Getty Images 29 of 33Actress Gwen Lee. 1927.Hulton Archive/Getty Images 30 of 33Jean Arthur, the stage name of Gladys Greene, doing her impression of Spain’s original flapper, Carmen. 1929.Eugene Robert Richee/Hulton Archive/Getty Images 31 of 33Actress Lila Lee roller skates with a sail in Hollywood. Date unspecified. Keystone-France/Gamma-Keystone via Getty Images 32 of 33Actress Joan Crawford. 1927.Wikimedia Commons 33 of 33Like this gallery?Share it:

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“The Modern Young Girl Is A Delight”: Flapper Fashion Of The Jazz Age View Gallery

The etymology of the word “flapper” in reference to an audacious and fashionable lady of the 1920s is unclear. Flapper meant “young wild-duck or partridge” in the mid-16th century, and one could conceivably draw comparisons between wild young fowl and green-but-game girls flapping their limbs and flaunting their fashion as they flirted and danced the Charleston.

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33 Photos Of Flappers That Show The Jazz Age It Girls In Action

The Tragic Tale Of Clara Bow, The Original Flapper Girl Who Took Hollywood By Storm

33 Images Of The Roaring Twenties That Capture The Jazz Age In Full Swing

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And if you liked this post, be sure to check out these popular posts:

33 Photos Of Flappers That Show The Jazz Age It Girls In Action

The Tragic Tale Of Clara Bow, The Original Flapper Girl Who Took Hollywood By Storm

33 Images Of The Roaring Twenties That Capture The Jazz Age In Full Swing

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33 Photos Of Flappers That Show The Jazz Age It Girls In Action

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33 Images Of The Roaring Twenties That Capture The Jazz Age In Full Swing

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1 of 33A flapper hangs a poster to advertise the Greenwich Village Halloween Ball. Date unspecified.Bettmann/Getty Images

2 of 33Actor James Hall playing marbles on the film lot with colleagues Louise Brooks, Nancy Phillips, Doris Hill, and Josephine Dunn. Date unspecified.Hulton Archive/Getty Images

3 of 33Norma Talmadge plays an Austrian girl in the film The Woman Disputed. 1928.Hulton Archive/Getty Images

4 of 33Colleen Moore, star of the silent screen. 1929.Margaret Chute/Getty Images

5 of 33Louise Brooks. 1927.Wikimedia Commons

6 of 33Actress Louise Brooks with her famous bobbed hairstyle. 1929.John Kobal Foundation/Getty Images

7 of 33Actress Lupe Velez bracing her hands on two low counters in Chicago, Illinois. 1929. Chicago History Museum/Getty Images

8 of 33American actresses Kathleen Clifford and Betty Compson stage a mock fight with their fur stoles. 1920.FPG/Getty Images

9 of 33Canadian actress Marie Prevost. 1920. APIC/Getty Images

10 of 33American actress Marion Davies. Date unspecified.Apic/Getty Images

11 of 33Actress Mary Brian in costume as a cigarette girl. 1928.Eugene Robert Richee/Margaret Chute/Getty Images

12 of 33Actress Mary Nolan as she appeared in Shanghai Lady in typical flapper fashion. Circa 1929.Bettmann/Getty Images

13 of 33Girl in flapper garb. Moscow, Idaho. 1922.Wikimedia Commons

14 of 33Canadian-born actress Norma Shearer. 1928.Margaret Chute/Getty Images

15 of 33Norma Shearer. Date unspecified.Wikimedia Commons

16 of 33Hollywood film star Clara Bow in a shiny strapless dress. 1926.Eugene Robert Richee/John Kobal Foundation/Getty Image

17 of 33Hollywood actress Evelyn Brent with her collection of shoes. 1925.C. E. Day/Margaret Chute/Getty Images

18 of 33Swimming suit-clad flapper strikes a pose on a breakwater. 1925. Kirn Vintage Stock/Corbis via Getty Images

19 of 33Actress Dorothy Mackaill stars in the film The Whip. 1928.Hulton Archive/Getty Images

20 of 33American actress Viola Dana. 1924. APIC/Getty Images

21 of 33A flapper plays her banjo in the front yard. 1925. Kirn Vintage Stock/Corbis via Getty Images

22 of 33Actress Alice White. 1929.Hulton Archive/Getty Images

23 of 33Anita Page wearing a slinky dress and a sultry smile. 1928.General Photographic Agency/Getty Images

24 of 33Singer, dancer and entertainer Josephine Baker wearing a dress decorated with feathers. 1930. General Photographic Agency/Getty Images

25 of 33Gabrielle Chanel, known as Coco, the French couturier. 1932.Evening Standard/Getty Images

26 of 33Hollywood film star Dorothy Sebastian checks the time on a small jade watch worn on a gold and jade chain around her neck. 1925. Clarence Sinclair Bull/Hulton Archive/Getty Images

27 of 33Canadian actress Fay Wray. 1925.Silver Screen Collection/Getty Images

28 of 33A flapper poses with her car. 1925. Kirn Vintage Stock/Corbis via Getty Images

29 of 33Actress Gwen Lee. 1927.Hulton Archive/Getty Images

30 of 33Jean Arthur, the stage name of Gladys Greene, doing her impression of Spain’s original flapper, Carmen. 1929.Eugene Robert Richee/Hulton Archive/Getty Images

31 of 33Actress Lila Lee roller skates with a sail in Hollywood. Date unspecified. Keystone-France/Gamma-Keystone via Getty Images

32 of 33Actress Joan Crawford. 1927.Wikimedia Commons

33 of 33Like this gallery?Share it:

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“The Modern Young Girl Is A Delight”: Flapper Fashion Of The Jazz Age View Gallery

“The Modern Young Girl Is A Delight”: Flapper Fashion Of The Jazz Age

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But while we aren’t clear where the word “flapper,” in its 1920s context, came from, we do know that those who wore the epithet proudly made a clear impact on pop culture – particularly when it came to flapper fashion.

Flappers embraced their fleeting post-World War I freedom from existential dread and their liberating post-Victorian freedom from constrictive corsetry and flaunted the luxurious designs of the day.

The reaction to this new type of woman was mixed, according to Margaret O’Leary, writing in the New York Times in 1922:

Among those optimists was Virginia Potter, President of the New York League of Girls Clubs, Inc., who saw flappers as revolutionaries:

To Potter, flappers replaced the typical “mid-Victorian clinging vine” debutantes sheltered by their mothers with a new era wielding “more sense than [their] grandmother[s] had when they were young” — particularly when it came to fashion.

The photos above don’t address the mores or politics of the flapper, but they do serve as a splendid portfolio of flapper fashion, where masculine cuts mingled with feminine furs, fresh bobs (“the badge of flapperhood”) framed powdered and painted faces and exposed necks and necklines while silhouettes widened to accommodate life in an energetic age of emancipation.

After this look at flapper fashion, check out Broadway’s Ziegfeld Follies. Then, take an exhilirating photographic tour of New York in the 1920s.

Flapper fashion meant embracing your freedom from constrictive corsetry and flaunting the luxurious designs of the Jazz Age.#

Flapper fashion meant embracing your freedom from constrictive corsetry and flaunting the luxurious designs of the Jazz Age.