Exploring the Past, Present, and Future of Fashion Information

The Adrian G. Marcuse Library and Nicole LaMoreaux, the organizer of the Fashion: Now & Then Conference, are pleased to release the January 2016 Fashion Manuscript article about the the 2015 Fashion: Now & Then: Passé, Presente, 未来 Conference. It can be read in its entirety here on page 46. 

“SALUDOS, AMIGOS!”: Fashion and The Good Neighbor Policy

Every great story has a subplot, and the subplot to fashion is trends!  We all know the sweeping saga of Forties’ fashion; it’s a tale of uniforms, utility and rationing.  Yet within its familiar fashion landscape of shoulder pads and ‘Make Do And Mend’, there existed a trend that embraced – not only fashion – but everything from music to movies, and from hobbies to home ware to hobbies; Latin America!

With most ‘South of the Border’ nations undeclared at the onset of WWII, Roosevelt set out to woo – not only our soon-to-be allies to the South – but a weary American public.  Re-billing the decades’ old Pan-American Agreement, “The Good Neighbor Policy” was launched upon a war torn American public, each longing for the tropical idyll and the carefree exoticism they imagined existed in Brazil, Argentina, Cuba, et al.

A  forgotten slice of American cultural history, “The Good Neighbor Policy” heralded many fashion trends still popular today (espadrilles, peasant blouses), and in her paper, “SALUDOS, AMIGOS!”: Fashion and The Good Neighbor Policy, Professor Amanda Hallay will disinter a moment in 20^thCentury History when all one needed was rum-based cocktail and a Bakelite sombrero pin to transport oneself away from the worrisome Home Front and into a land where perhaps people really didwear bananas on their heads.

Amanda Hallay will be presenting “SALUDOS, AMIGOS!”: Fashion and The Good Neighbor Policy on Thursday, October 22, 2015 at the Fashion: Now & Then: Passé, Presente, 未来 Conference. 

Register today!