99% Invisible - Pockets: Articles of Interest #3

Episode Date: October 3, 2018

Womenswear is littered with fake pockets that don’t open, or shallow pockets that can hardly hold more than a paperclip. If women's clothes have pockets at all, they are often and smaller and just fit less than men’s pockets do. And when we talk about pockets, we are talking about who has access to the tools they need. Who can walk through the world comfortably and securely. Articles of Interest is a show about what we wear; a six-part series within 99% Invisible, looking at clothing. It is produced and hosted by Avery Trufelman. Episodes will be released on Tuesdays and Fridays from September 25th through October 12th. Pockets: Articles of Interest #3

I had never worn a dress before. I'm sure it was like slightly graceless as like all the things I did at the time seem to have been. I met peers on our very first week in college. It must have been day one or two. It was really early. We went to a super PC liberal arts school and so our freshman mixer was a cross-dressing dance, which is such an outdated term now, but whatever, that's what it was called. I think all they told us was you should wear clothes of the opposite gender. They probably said it in a way that's slightly more, you know, literate in the differences between gender and biological sex than what I just said. It was a strange way to make first impressions

on each other, not because we were scared of wearing dresses or backwards baseball caps or whatever we wore that night. It was because for many of us, we had to borrow clothes from the other people in our hall. It was weirdly intimate. Pears and I, complete strangers, swapped outfits. You're tall and I'm tall and I think that you're probably the only person in the hall of not the building whose clothes would have fit me.

I remember I loaned Pears a pink, swirly patterned mini-dressed from the 60s that I had bought from a thrift store, and I had no idea if he would take care of it or even return it, but Pears tried it on. It looked great. And he went to check himself out in the bathroom down the hall. And here's what happened next. I immediately locked myself out of my room. And I was like, oh no, my keys are in my room, room because I didn't have ever put them. The dress had no pockets. Peers is brand new roommate, let him

back in. But then he went to sleep. So Peers wanted to make sure he didn't make that mistake again. He couldn't lose his keys at the party. We all ended up in the big dance hall where there's really loud music. And it was like unbearably hot. All the ladies eyebrow pencil mustaches were running onto their teeth with sweat and things like that. And I believe I just clutched my keys in my hand and thought about it really hard all night, which sounds crazy. Articles of interest, a show about what we wear.

And so maybe the idea is about clothing. You can attach. Our idea is about class. An idea of home to a piece of cloth. These are glass for a market-eo or a kind of... I want it. Any fork and wear clothes, but if you haven't got the attitude and style to carry it off,

man, you're just the clothes boss. Women's wear is littered with fake pockets that don't open or shallow pockets that could hardly hold a paperclip. If there are pockets at all, they are just smaller and they fit less than men's pockets do. And you don't have to take my word for it. Here we are going to the police supply store. I wanted to find an example of a uniform that had pockets and compared those made for men and those for women. This is the shop that provides the uniforms

for the Oakland police. And when I asked the store manager if I could look at the men's and women's uniforms, this is what he told me. Are you ready for this? I'm ready for this. The women wear the men's. Really?

Because the pockets are too small and women's. Wait, really? That's right? That is why. But there is a women's that they make. But I don't care, well, I've got some over here. But traditionally, they use the mins because the pockets are bigger. And they can put things in them where the women are smaller, which I can show you.

Yes. And they won't fit. That's fascinating. Now you have something to blog about. I'll give you something to blog about. Man's great evolutionary advantage is the creation of tools. The problem is we're not marsupials. We need to carry them somehow.

And this idea of who has access to the tools they need, who can walk through the world comfortably and securely. This is what we are talking about when we talk about pockets. Pockets speak to this question of preparedness and your ability to move in public and to be confident. It's really difficult to get around if you don't have what you need and it's about, I think, mobility and movement in public. Hana Carlson lectures at the Rhode Island School of Design where she teaches classes in material culture, fashion history, and fashion theory.

And she is working on a book about pockets. If the formal question for me is, what difference does it make? But, you know, what's the difference between a pocket and a bag? And I think the key difference is that the pocket is internal and its secret. A bag can be stolen. A bag can be lost. And then, that's it. You don't have your things anymore.

With the pocket inside, you don't have to think about it. You forget about it. But you still have stuff in there. It is seen as this territory of your own that connects you to the objects you carry. Those objects become part of you. Case in point, Thomas Jefferson. Jefferson was called a walking calculator for all of the miniature tools and devices he carried. miniature scales, drawing instruments, a thermometer, a surveying compass, a level, a globe, and he was able to jot down his observations

from his daily wanderings. Historically, men have been the ones with these tools for public life on their person at all times. In Hana Carlson's research, she found a lot of accounts of women complaining about this. One woman noted that her son was better equipped than she or her daughter. And she concludes that a boy's pockets are his certificate of empire. All through life, he will carry the scepter of dominion by the right of his pockets. I mean, so this is great language I loved.

I mean, it's playful, it's funny, but there's some seriousness here about what later cost him historians call real social handicap. Pockets are just a perfect metaphor for privilege, not only because they are so easily taken for granted by the people who have them, but also because, like the categories of race and gender themselves, pocket disparity is a construct. It's made up. There's no reason for women's pockets to be so small. Back in the 18th century, women's pockets were quite large. You could hold quite a lot of them. There are accounts of women putting food in it to eat later.

accounts of women putting food in it to eat later. They would have writing tools, maybe a small diary, sewing implements. They could carry quite a lot, especially if you had two. This is Clarissa Escara. Yes, I'm Clarissa Escara. I am the associate curator of costumant textiles at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. And where are we now?

We are in a storage area at the museum for our department and so we have everything laid out on a table, currently covered with tissue, but I will reveal them one at a time. It was a little hard to picture on the radio, but indulge me for a second. Pockets used to be a completely separate garment. They were really more like pouches. Pockets being suspended from the waste has a really long history actually. It started for both men and women in the medieval era. They were suspended from their waste over their clothes. And then in some time in the late 17th century, men started having clothes made where pockets were incorporated. They were in their coats, their waste coats, and in their breeches. And women's pockets remained separate

from the rest of clothing. Oh, kind of like a fatty pack. No, no, no, no. I think, okay, think of the pockets on the inside of your jeans, right? Those tear-dropped, shaped pouches. They were kind of like that, but they were just on their own,

like separate from pants, and they were attached to a string. And these would be tied around the waist. Yes. And in some cases these patches are really big, like the length of your forearm. And these detachable pockets were then worn under women's dresses. So even though a lot of old dresses look like they have pockets, they really just have cut slits in them.

Women had slits made in the petty coats and dresses and they could access their pockets by going through those slits made in the petty coats and dresses, and they could access their pockets by going through those slits. You could reach through your dress to get to your detachable pocket pouches. Does that make sense? Sure, why not? Would you like to see them?

Yes. So I thought we would kind of start with a more simpler ones and then kind of go into the more complicated ones because they were really functional, but also they were an opportunity for Splendor. I'm actually just gonna cut to the complicated expensive fancy pockets because they are indeed very splendid. Oh Wow, so these were very very finely embroidered. This one is a silk pocket and it's lightly quilted and then it is covered with this beautiful

floral chain stitch embroidery. So these are all tiny, tiny, little chain stitches. Oh my god. It's really fine, and there's a pair of them at match. And this is something that she just wore. And only she and the woman who helped her get dressed, and perhaps her lover saw. Pockets were almost like lingerie, especially the beautiful expensive ones. The pockets were this intimate thing, close to the body, holding your most precious items

safe under the layers of your ginormous fluffy dress. And then came the French Revolution. The French Revolution happened. Which in many ways was a revolution against excess. These dresses that were made with voluminous silk skirts were no longer fashionable and what was fashionable were muslin dresses that clung to the body. So when you get to the 1800 and that empire style where the waist is pretty much gone, you know,

think of Jane Austen movies. You have the Kalomner silhouette. A silhouette like a straight Greek column. And some of these Kalomner dresses have slits for pockets, but a lot of them are too bodyhugging to accommodate extra bulge. There's no space for pockets, and so suddenly women begin to carry little purses. And there's lots of ridicule about women having to lose

their pockets and having to carry these silly bags. And at the time they called them reticules because they were so small. It's like ridiculous. Like ridiculous. Reticules were teeny, teeny tiny little drawstring pouches, elaborately beaded and decorated. They held maybe a few coins and some keys, but like that's it. And you could hang the loops of the drawstring around your wrist, which was another reason why

it was considered ridiculous. You have to remember to carry it. It's easy to lose. People can steal it. That's the formal difference. But that's kind of the price you pay for a fashion. The little bags were in style. And I mean, you can see why, if you look at them,

they're beautiful. They're very fancy, beautiful things, shell shaped, or made of silk and gorgeous things. They're to be seen, they're not particularly capacious. This is dress historian Barbara Burman. The reticule becomes a kind of temporary fashionista thing, and so you get journalist writing in the first and second decades of the 19th century about

pocketists and anti-poketists. The fashion press made pockets seem like they were for housewives, for women who needed to lug around sewing kits and bits of food they were saving for later. Anti-poketists were going out dancing and gambling. They have these beautiful little reticles and they are much more fashionable and they don't need to carry keys and bibles and stacks of pins or all these useful things in their pockets because they don't do, they don't have that kind of life. They're much more out and about.

And so you have the pocketist, anti-pocketist debate that's strong along to gain readership I suppose. In the 19th century, fashion magazines were saying it was a liberating thing for women not to have pockets, to be free from tasks, reticules which hardly held anything, were kind of like long nails that don't let you use your hands as much, or siletto heels that don't let you walk as far. There's that luxury in not moving too much or doing too much and just looking really good.

And it's always been an ongoing debate if that is empowering or not. But it's not like the reticule completely killed the tie-on pocket. They were still around. A woman could perfectly well have a pair of pockets and also a reticule for when she wanted to be at show. They coexist and this kind of pocket clearly outlives the reticule. You find them in use in the 17th century, going right through to the 20th century.

So why don't we have these anymore, if it wasn't for the club? It's such a waste of life. So it's me. You know, if you can come up with a good answer, it's very difficult to pinpoint it. They fade from use, they become old fashioned. More dresses start to have integrated pockets,

but they're often very small. They're not always, but they're often very small, not always, but they are often very small and very difficult to access. The women's wear that had integrated pockets tended to be feminized versions of men's wear. Made by men, they're made by tailors, not dress makers, and out of habits, tailors would be putting in proper fitted-in pockets, so to speak, like men's pockets, so they're because they're using male tailoring techniques. Basically, if an outfit had an in-set pocket,

it was a uselessly proportioned version of a man's pattern. The pocket is seen to be a monopoly of the male sex, eventually. It's pockets and trousers are one. And as women's fashions change, pockets can be lost. And as men's fashions change, pockets can be lost. And as men's fashions change, pockets can be gained. And they were, again and again and again, pockets were getting added and added and added over the course of decades. And by the early 20th century, it was just getting ridiculous.

Copious amounts of pockets. I can't even like you have your ticket pocket for the train, you have your coin pocket, watch pocket, breast pocket. Then you have all the pockets in your waistcoat and then in your trousers. It's really interesting and women have one purse. Both gendered extremes were starting to get terrible. Because pockets had proliferated, they had become completely worthless. You couldn't find anything. You've stopped on the street, you have to pat yourself down to remember where you've left your wallet. The average man of 1944 had 24 pockets.

Way too many. At least according to Bernard Rudolfski. He was kind of enraged by the way that pockets kept sort of popping up. Bernard Rudolfski was an architect, a modernist architect, and modernists were really into sleek, simple buildings that were absolutely functional with no excess. He was this modernist who wanted to make clothing perfectly rational. And he found it ironic that all his fellow rational modernist architects were all wearing suits. He wanted to, I think, shake up this confidence that we have about the suit and suggest, no, no, it is not modern in any way.

It has all sorts of old ideas and beliefs, and this pocket that was once functional is now no longer functional because we have so many. And to prove his point, Godloven, Rudolfski puts on an exhibit at the New York Museum of Modern Art in 1944, and it was called our Close Modern question mark. Our Close Modern was the question. The answer was no.

The central piece in Rudolfski's Moma exhibit was this big, multi-layered infographic chart. It looked like an X-ray of a man's three-piece suit. We have color-coded the pockets in his shirt, in his vest, in his coat, and overcoat. And you see this wonderful, sort of chaotic overlay of 24 pockets. The average suit had 24 pockets and 70 buttons. Rudolfski was really passionate about how completely silly and redundant this was.

The guy is a wonderful nutball. But Rudolfski was really onto something, because he wasn't only about abolishing suits. He thought that at the root of this insane pocket conundrum was a much larger problem, which is about generally what we consider clothing to be. Clothing hanging on hangars to him looked like people's sort of dead skins. You know, and he wanted to be able to show that we, you know, you could travel to a friend's house and they would have clothes for you because clothing wouldn't be individual to the body. A universal size, universal clothing, unisex clothing.

Universal clothing, according to Rudolfski, would be more like a toga or a peril that embraced the nature of cloth itself, something that would drape and move naturally. You know, he hated the idea that through clothes we could show ideas about status and gender that were unfair. He hated the expense, the waste, and so he wanted this, you know, really simple cloth. And of course, the images that he showed, his ideas for this new utopian future, are very

simple clothing that have no pockets. A world with no pockets at all and no bags. You might know the perfect world when you arrive there by its pocketlessness. My college friend Pierce got really into researching and reading about pockets long after his debacle with my dress. There's this whole strain of thought which suggests that if the world were perfect, if society were perfect, if we lived in a utopia of some kind, where you didn't have to worry about your physical safety,

you didn't have to worry about somebody robbing your house, you wouldn't need pockets in order to carry money in order to carry keys. And certainly, in the course of time, we have come to hold fewer and fewer things in our pockets. All those little devices that Jeffersz or contained in a single phone that we carry externally on our body, and the pocket really is this sort of knowledge envelope, this compartment. But the phone stays adjacent to us, removed, encased in a bag or pocket. And tech companies have tried to sell us on wearables, on Apple Watches and Google Glasses,

which would take your tools out of your pocket entirely, and maybe bring us a step closer to that pocketless utopia. But these products haven't taken off in the way they were supposed to. Wearables were foreseen a long time ago, and we still feel a little bit anxious about their use. I think there's just too much doubt at the moment about whether that utopia can ever work. And perhaps one day we will have all of our tools implanted in our skull or embedded on an accessory which everyone will be able to access in the same way. And then when we get there, pockets will

seem just as ancient as Rudolfsky thought them to be. Already it seems so antiquated that clothes are needlessly gendered in the way they are. Because we should all have access to the tools we need. Or at least a place to put our hands. The piece of paper Words from yesterday There's a portrait painted on the things we love Articles of interest is made by myself, Averchrupplement No. Articles of interest is made by myself, Aver Troubleman, with editing from Katie Mingle and Joe Rosenberg, music by Ray Royal, intro and outro themes

by Susami Ashworth, fact check by Graham Hisha, mixed by Sheree Fusef, and Roman Mars is the deep pockets of this whole series. Special thanks to Peer's Gellie for telling me about this topic in his podcast, Celerdore, as well as to Delaney Hall, Emmett Fitzgerald, Vivian Lee, Kurt Colstad, Sean Riel, and the whole 99PI team. The fakes on women's wear are proof that fashion always takes useful things and makes them ridiculous. Fashionable dress prefers the assertion of utility to utility itself.

Like how plaid fell into style once it couldn't be worn in Scotland anymore, or how high heels developed from riding shoes, but became trendy once we took them off horseback. Who was it? Oh, Anne Hollander notes that fashion instantly mocks sensible inventions and clothing, subjecting them to unfunctional usage as soon as they appear.

And that's absolutely true of pockets. I mean, you can think of the wonderful ornate suits of the macaroni. Like when Yankee Doodle sticks a feather in his hat, he thinks that makes him one of these dandy macaroni. Who were these British youth in the 1770s and 80s? These young men with big elaborate hairdos and these tight little coats coats and their coats were so narrow and form fitting that once again in the name of fashion their front pockets became useless. And so now they have this pocket that makes no sense and so tailors invented what is the breast pocket, put it you know inside the coat at the breast.

Clothing is always shifting in and out of practicality and sometimes just because something is useless doesn't mean it's meaningless. Like with a pocket, even if it can't hold much, sometimes it matters that it's there. And sometimes, it matters exactly how it's placed. Your next article of interest is The Hawaiian Shirt.