The bikini made its debut in 1946 as the simultaneous creation of 2 French designers—Jacques Heim, a fashion designer who owned a beach shop in the French resort town of Cannes and Louis Reard, a French automotive engineer who ran his mother’s lingerie business. It was Reard who named the two piece bathing suit the “bikini” after the Bikini Atoll—a small group of tiny islands in the Pacific. The bikini was to be the smallest of the world’s “smallest bathing suit.” Reard’s bikini took only 30 inches of fabric and his launching of this smallest bathing suit literally became an atomic blast as reaction to his creation was quick and explosive.
Despite the inflammatory response to the bikini, it took several years before this bathing suit became a popular consumer item. In fact, sales were very slow at first, especially in Catholic countries which shunned the bikini. In 1951, the wearing of the two piece bathing suit was banned from the Miss World Pageant, further exacerbating the negative publicity of the item.
It wasn’t until the sixties that the bikini caught the world by storm; Brian Hyland’s runaway hit “Itsy Bitsy Teenie Weenie Yellow Polka Dot Bikini” raised bikini consicousness to the top of pop song charts. Hollywood added oil to the fire when stars strutted on screen and off in 2 piece bathing suits—from Bridget Bardot in “And God Created Woman” to Annette Funicello in “Beach Party.” The screen ignited the imagination of the teen crowd and bikini sales skyrocketed for almost 20 years. In the 1970’s, the bikini became more outrageous and daring still, morphing into the string bikini, known as the thong.
Through the eighties and mid nineties, bikini sales began to slide as the one-piece bathing suit made a comeback. Sales in bikinis dropped to less than a third of the woman’s bathing suit market. Even Reard’s company could not survive the negative turn of events. It folded in 1988. In the late nineties, bikini sales started going up again, but it has not been able to capture the audience in the way it did in the sixties.
Part of the reason for this is that the bikini is a source of anxiety for many women. Despite the flaunting of bikini clad stars and models in several popular magazines, bikinis, on the whole, are not accepted unconditionally as a woman’s best friend. In fact, a survey done early in 2006 in UK revealed a surprising fact: many women are uneasy about wearing a bikini. Almost a third of the women surveyed (29.9%) said that having to wear a bikini was what they dreaded most about the summer holidays, coming after 17% who said that falling ill abroad was their biggest fear and 11% who claimed that delays at the airport were their biggest fear.
Moreover, 48.7% of those questioned said that the worst aspect of beauty preparation for the holidays was having to get slim enough to look good in a bikini. Compare this to 31% who claimed that painful waxing was the worst. The bikini was also voted by 29.4% (second place) to be the most unflattering item of clothing ever invented. And even among those women who were confident enough to wear a bikini, 54% said that they would prefer to be hot and bothered under a T-shirt than to bare all.
The survey study reveals what woman have always known—that baring all does not come naturally—probably not even in the Garden of Eden. So much anxiety and vulnerability are associated with being bare that the sexual confidence exuded by bikini clad models in Vogue and similar magazines is probably more than anything else, a creation of the media. Many women feel that wearing the bikini requires even more vigilant skin and body treatments which they may not have time for–bikini hair removal and bikini waxing. As one woman said to me recently,” With having to get my hair colored and highlighted, my face peeled and waxed, my back massaged, my body mineral wrapped,my nails conditioned and painted, I don’t have time for anything else--let alone work!”
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Visit Mary at GreatBodyat50
A runner for 27 years, retired schoolteacher and writer, Mary is helping people reclaim their bodies. Nutrition, exercise, positive vision and purposeful engagement are the tools used to turn their bodies into creative selves.
Mary is hosting a 13 episode Internet Radio series on "Reclaiming The Body's Wisdom"
October 5/06 to January 4/07
Every Thursday 12 Noon PT/3PM ET
Guests include Dr. Bruce Lipton ( The Biology of Belief) Dr. Lee Pulos ( The Biology Of Empowerment) Dr. John Diamond ( Your Body Does Not Lie, The Diamond Color Meditation)
Watch for Mary's Show here
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