Back in the day, dressmakers didn’t sew pockets in women’s wear. Instead, 17th-century ladies would wear tiny sacks on belts around their waists, tucked away under skirts. Large hidden pockets, well explainable by women’s inborn nature of gatherers, customized with personal embellishments, were accessible through slits in the outer layer of a dress. The implied feminization of women’s clothing made women’s dresses tighter over time, making hiding hefty sacks underneath garments challenging, as it would ruin the dress’s silhouette.
In the 1700s, under-dress pockets were moved outside, to small purses. It was believed that a home-tight housekeeper didn’t need to carry things anyway, and, if that was the case, only for decorative purposes. Hence, the ever-rising popularity of the purse industry.
By the 1800s, formfitting women’s apparel saw the return of pockets built into them, following the trend already tailored to perfection in men’s clothing. Yet, since women’s dress pockets weren’t considered a necessity, dressmakers put women’s pockets in such impractical locations that the question became politicized by feminists, fighting for «pocket equality.»
Things improved throughout the years, but there is still a long path to equity regarding dress pockets. Also, the purse industry won’t give up easily, powered by billions of dollars of profits yearly. One of today’s challenges in designing women’s dresses is to make carrying around a mobile device easy for them. Fashion designers believe in the future of female clothing, which prioritizes storage.
