Kimberly Chrisman-Campbell reflects on the history of the midi skirt – the miniskirt’s more subdued cousin:
Ironically, feminism became the midi’s worst enemy; liberated women refused to purchase whole new wardrobes just because fashion magazines told them to. In an October 1970 article titled “Fashion Fascism: The Politics of Midi,” the San Francisco counterculture fashion magazine Rags decried the midi as a capitalist “conspiracy”; in addition to being “cumbersome and matronly” it had “built-in obsolescence.” (How this differentiated it from any other fashion trend, the magazine did not specify.) With inflation on the rise, the midi was an economic encumbrance, too; the longer length required a higher price point.
The warring interests of consumers, retailers, and the fashion press culminated in what Newsweek called “the midi-skirt debacle of 1970.” One midwestern shopkeeper complained in a letter to Women’s Wear Daily in mid-August: “You are doing quite a disservice to the manufacturers and retailers by trying to promote a fashion that the customers are not ready for.” Vogue suffered a 38 percent drop in ad revenue in the first three months of 1971; many of its advertisers had been burned by the backlash. Vreeland was unceremoniously demoted to consulting editor in May, but the damage was done: Consumer confidence in fashion magazines—and the fashion industry in general—was replaced by a rebellious cynicism.
The Dish 