Talk:Hemline

New chart/graph
Uploaded a convenient graph image; it may not be entirely suitable for Wikipedia in its current version, but could probably be made so with a little adjustment. Churchh (talk) 04:34, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

Restoration of Clothing category
Hi all,

I re-added the Clothing category here, for a few reasons:


 * Knitted and crocheted garments can also have hems (not just sewn garments).


 * Although hemlines have historically been a key variable in fashion, hemlines also play a functional role in clothing, in providing extra weight and protection at the garment's lower boundary, as well as making a "tube" in which elastic or other materials may be threaded. That suggests that hemlines pertain also to clothing per se, not just to fashion.


 * Also, it would be nice if "Hemline" could be found together with its sister articles, such as Neckline and waistline (clothing).

Please let me know what you all think, WillowW 16:31, 22 June 2006 (UTC)


 * Sounds good. Should the definition of hemline be specific to skirts, or does the word apply to pants as well?  Each of the categories listed could be its own page with the names of garments with a specific hemlines (pants with a hem at knee level = bermuda shorts, for example).  Just a thought. P L Logan 21:08, 10 October 2006 (UTC)


 * Purely logically, one might think that the word hemline could theoretically be used to refer to trousers, but in real-world usage, I don't think this has actually been done very much. Churchh 11:01, 18 October 2006 (UTC)


 * I feel that the article is very specific, it only talks about women and focuses mainly in the United States and the impact hemlines had on American women. Furthermore, I believe that a section on hemlines in other cultures should be added, for instance in Scotland men use skirts. (This comment was made by Anamelissaah on 2017-05-25, and was relocated from middle of discussion to the end by Mabalu (talk) 09:29, 25 May 2017 (UTC))


 * It's about the history of Western fashion, which was quite similar for middle- and upper-class women across most western countries (leaving aside "die Tracht"). And kilt hemlines really do not go up and down the way that women's changing styles do. Churchh (talk) 03:47, 8 June 2017 (UTC)

More than just time

 * "The hemline is perhaps the most variable style line in fashion, changing shape and ranging in height from the hips to the floor within a few years."

This makes it sound as though the length of anything with a hem depends only on the time in history, and not on the weather, the choice of the individual, the occasion or any other factors. Which would be total nonsense. We ought to clear up this statement. -- Smjg 17:51, 11 December 2006 (UTC)


 * Actually, prior to 1970 or so, the "stylish" hemline height was very strongly linked to the state of the economy, and only weakly linked to anything else. --Carnildo (talk) 19:30, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

measured from the floor.
"The hemline is the line (...) measured from the floor. " The one measured is not the hemline (a line, the lower edge of a garment, usually horizontal, and that, as the article states can change " changing shape") this is the distance of the hemline form the floor (a imaginary vertical line). --109.55.23.137 (talk) 09:15, 27 March 2014 (UTC)

Chart of 1920s hemlines
To see an actual empirical data-derived chart of hemline heights in the 1920s, see p. 395 of Survey of Historic Costume (ISBN 1-56367-142-5). The lowest year is 1923 (with April and October 1923 being the lowest months), while the highest years are 1927 and 1928, with September 1927 being the highest month. Unfortunately, the format of the chart doesn't make it easy to see where the September 1927 hemline falls with respect to the knees. Churchh (talk) 22:21, 16 September 2014 (UTC)