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Brook, P, 2023. Modernism and the swimsuit: an investigation into the aesthetic, social and material properties of the interwar knitted swimsuit. PhD, Nottingham Trent University.
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Abstract
This thesis examines the interwar knitted woollen swimsuit, an extant garment that is a significant piece of material culture. Between 1930 and 1939; 180 outdoor swimming pools and lidos were built in the UK. Swimming became a ‘democratic exercise’ a means of keeping fit and healthy. The aesthetics of modernism evident in the architecture of the lidos demanded purity of form in both building and body. The swimsuit highlighted the uneven class landscape in which those ideals of ‘democracy’ and ‘pure form’ played out.
Anecdotal evidence and surveyed literature indicated that home knitted swimsuits sagged. An experiment was conducted to ascertain the material differential between manufactured and home-made swimsuits when tested in water. Archival research enabled the recreation of an expensive manufactured swimsuit and home-made ones from 1930s knitting patterns. The recreations were used to test the performative qualities of both when swum in. Narrative accounts from the swimmers, their embodiment of the garment and the re-enactment proved to be essential in determining class differential in the swimsuit.
The experiment revealed a material referent for the fact that claims for democracy in swimming were undermined by saggy home-knitted swimwear. Modesty, reliability and body-confidence were evidently only available to those who could afford a manufactured swimsuit.
Archival research into company advertising and women’s magazines demonstrated that the bid to achieve the most glamourous figure-fit swimsuit was ongoing during the interwar period. The garment as material, as image (in both promotional material, documentary photography and memory) and in relation to the materials and surfaces of both the wearing body and the environments in which it was worn are central to the thesis.
The study took a multi-method approach, consisting of interviews, archival research, re-creation and re-enactment. It drew on fashion and textile history and theory, and social, philosophical, and political theory. The findings offer a different approach to garment study. Links have been made between the swimsuit and interwar healthy body culture but this thesis firmly locates the garment in ideas about hygiene, class, eugenics and the perfected body.
The thesis also explores the connections made through the metonymic meanings of surfaces such as purity and impermeability in concrete, chrome and the swimsuit as a second skin. The study finally considers the aspirations of interwar ideas about glamour in both body and building and the reality of maintaining these in daily life and for posterity.
| Item Type: | Thesis |
|---|---|
| Description: | Abridged version. |
| Creators: | Brook, P. |
| Contributors: | Name Role NTU ID ORCID |
| Date: | November 2023 |
| Rights: | The copyright in this work is held by the author. You may copy up to 5% of this work for private study, or personal, non-commercial research. Any re-use of the information contained within this document should be fully referenced, quoting the author, title, university, degree level and pagination. Queries or requests for any other use, or if a more substantial copy is required, should be directed to the author. |
| Divisions: | Schools > School of Art and Design |
| Record created by: | Jeremy Silvester |
| Date Added: | 11 Jul 2025 12:47 |
| Last Modified: | 11 Jul 2025 12:47 |
| URI: | https://irep.ntu.ac.uk/id/eprint/53939 |
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0855-920XActions (login required)
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