enced by and contributed to American popular cul-
ture. Pop star Madonna and the movieFlashdance
(1983), for example, both inspired distinctive styles
of dress. Meanwhile, an increase in disposable in-
come drove the national appetite for high fashion,
as designers such as Donna Karan and Ralph Lauren
marketed sophisticated clothing lines for women.
Such lines were designed to be wearable in the work-
place, an increasingly important part of women’s
lives.
Youth Fashion Madonna had a strong influence
on youthful styles, from her wildly teased and color-
ful hair to her lace bodices and fishnet stockings.
“Big hair,” in fact, was one of the noted styles of the
1980’s, starting the decade with strange hair colors
and cuts. From 1985 to the end of the 1980’s, asym-
metrical cuts were the rage, with hair worn at differ-
ent lengths on opposite sides of the head, or cut a
different length in front than it was in back. Earrings
became fashionable for male teenagers, and they
added yet another symbol to the developing alter-
nate sexuality counterculture. Some teens pierced
their right ears to indicate that they were gay. A left-
ear piercing thus came to some to indicate hetero-
sexuality.
Leg warmers also came into fashion early in the
decade. Designed initially for dancers to wear over
their thin tights between performances or during re-
hearsals, black leg warmers had been popular with
amateur and professional performers for years. Af-
ter Jennifer Beals wore them inFlashdance, however,
they caught on in wider circles and became available
in wild colors and weaves. They were worn over jeans
and under dresses and were even layered in differ-
ent colors. Nightclub patrons wore them over eve-
ning sandals or pumps. However, leg warmers en-
joyed only a brief period of popularity, and the craze
was over by 1985.
A more sustained innovation of the 1980’s was
acid-washed denim. By 1987, young men and women
discovered acid-washed jeans, manufactured utiliz-
ing a chemical process that stripped off the top layer
of the demin to reveal a white surface with blue un-
dertones. This style came in black as well, and a
denim jacket could be worn to match the jeans.
Acid-washed denim, or a fashion designed to imitate
the original process, was still being worn a decade
later.
Another fashion was adopted by the youth subcul-
ture that defined itself as “gothic,” or “goth,” which
emerged from the punk culture of the late 1970’s
and early 1980’s. Punks had distinctive clothing,
dyed hair, and pierced body parts, and their general
attitude was anger. In the mid-1980’s, Anthony H.
Wilson, who managed the rock bandJoy Division,
tagged the band “gothic,” and the term was appro-
priated to summarize a lifestyle. Goths dressed in
black, often dying their hair to match, and they
shared a dark and brooding mind-set associated with
gothic novels. Young people often became goths
to express alienation from traditional society, and
while the goth subculture emphasized mysticism
and the dark side of life, it also embraced tolerance,
freethinking, and mixing traditional gender roles.Women’s Fashions One of the most striking wom-
en’s fashions was shoulder pads, which were ubiqui-
tous in the 1980’s and remained popular in the first
few years of the 1990’s. The style’s popularity was in-
fluenced by a prime-time soap opera,Dynasty, whose
star, Linda Evans, had naturally broad shoulders en-
hanced with pads. Suits with shoulder pads soon
came to be seen as a way to “power dress” in the work-
place. This was a subtle way to indicate women were
the equal of men in the office, and many women’s
outfits had Velcro stitched to the inside shoulder to
allow the attachment of differently sized pads. Late
in the decade, a new trend toward wearing casual
clothes in the workplace began, with “casual Fridays”
adopted widely among companies.
Lingerie worn as outerwear was another fashion
trend in the 1980’s, when, by the middle of the de-
cade, it was not unusual to see slip or bra straps delib-
erately showing. Madonna’s fashion choices were in-
fluential here as well. Lacy camisoles worn under
jackets or sweaters became popular, as did camisoles
with built-in bras. Slip dresses and skirts, made of
shiny or flimsy fabrics and trimmed with lace, were
featured in fashion magazines. Women began to
prefer satin for lingerie, and the Jockey Company,
known as a manufacturer of men’s underwear,
started to produce French cuts trimmed with lace
for more conservative women. The teddy, a one-
piece camisole attached to tap pants, was a stylish un-
dergarment.
Historicism, or looking to the past for new styles,
played a significant role in the world of fashion in
the 1980’s. John Galliano, an influential designer,
created Empire dresses in 1986 as a distinct nod to358 Fashions and clothing The Eighties in America