French Knickers
May 25, 2009 –
My favourite panties are French. Yes I know I am a total Francophile but it seems to me that many, many wonderful things come from France. Champagne, wine, food, furniture, perfume …. Back to pants. I love, adore, covet french knickers. Quite hard to find these days. I remember buying my first pair when I was around 14. I wanted to look like the glamourous 1940′s starlets that you could see in old magazines. I think also, that they are more flattering than a thong (anything is more flattering than a thong, who invented that thing??!) So you can imagine my delight when I shop for lingerie and a set fulfills all four of my requirements;
1) Has to fit a lady with an ample bosom
2) Has to have a matching suspender belt (dont like hold ups!)
3) Has to be beautifully made
and 4) Oh french knicks as well? – what joy!
I was very lucky with the set you see above. It’s a Janet Reger design and I have it in cream too. If there were more colours at the boutique, I would have bought them all. Vive la France!
A little bit from Wiki…
French knickers may have been so called since they were mimicry of the ‘visible’ underwear associated with Parisienne dancing, notably the Can-Can. The French themselves do not use this term for this style. The English began to associate the term with naughty or risque activity due to the connection to Montmartre and Pigalle, but in reality these knickers evolved into their final form from bloomers, the baggy, shapeless long-legged underwear of the Victorian era. By the 1950′s French knickers were almost the standard for British women and by the sixties this style was mass-produced in the ‘new’ nylon and other synthetic fabrics. A more practical design of French knickers had arrived, and proved very popular.
In the mid to late 1970s French Knickers, designed by Janet Reger and others, brought erotic and exotic style to lingerie. Of course major manufacturers through the 1980s to present day latched on to the trends.
Since the nineties, this style of lingerie has given ground in the marketplace to more aggressive styles for younger consumers. It becomes harder for major manufactuers to justify annual production, so they do not appear in shops at all often. They continue to hold the affection and attention of the generation who grew up with them, and as a result have transitioned back into the ‘naughty’ side of lingerie.
