but here and there among the conformist
fat-cat crowds is a lean cat or two
looking like it might swing given some
encouragement Maud you've seen it you've
heard of it but could you pick it out of
a crowd and could you tell what makes
each piece decidedly mod as it happens
the term mod comes from the word
modernists which described a group of
young London i'ts who listened to modern
jazz in the late 1950s British youth
have always leaned heavily on musicians
to inspire their fashion aesthetic but
the arrow leading into the 1960s was
ripe with an era of individual
expression youth culture started to
embrace an anything-goes mentality
this included fashion which up until
that point had been an afterthought for
men at best with the rise of beatniks
who grew their hair out and
philosophized in coffee shops as well as
Teddy boys who paraded around an
Edwardian zoot suits and called
themselves rebels the mod archetype
began to take shape they had no interest
in the greasy 1950s leather look they
were into a whole new way of life
they called themselves modernists
young teens would intermingle in coffee
shops which stayed open later than bars
and listen jazz records they dance to
the same tunes as well as swing music
and late night dance clubs which were
fueled by amphetamine use and frequented
by foreigners and slim fitted Italian
suits soon enough
the slim suit and skinny tie became
synonymous with a budding group of jazz
enthusiasts who call themselves the mods
they were very much about creating a new
type of modern person that was very
different from anything they saw in
their families their road Vespas and
Lambrettas the shop Carnaby streets hit
boutique clothing stores and they ride
it against the leather-clad
rock-and-roll loving motorcycle gangs
call themselves the rockers their
identity was a uniform and if you wore
it you were instantly part of the club
this is a mod suit single bracelet three
buttons you can see men took pride in
their meticulously tailored Italian
wardrobes to a point that bordered on
narcissism it was simple chic
sophisticated even their choice to use
vest bus for transportation reflected
the importance they placed on clean
visual lines
and though it was started by men women
jumped aboard the Maude movement to
naval maneuvers nope just a toot tummy
tosser with brandy glasses they dressed
androgynous Lee in men's trousers
donning short hair flat shoes winged
eyeliner and heavy mascara eventually
designer Mary Quant
a mod herself introduced the miniskirt
its clean lines suited the aesthetic
perfectly and before long it took off
American model peggy moffitt was also a
catalyst in shaving the radical style of
Maude with her subversive beauty
standards mask leg makeup an asymmetric
bob created by Vidal Sassoon in her
transformative career of modeling and
filmmaking she pioneered stylized
modeling gestures which helped bring to
small frame models into full view both
locally and abroad Jean Shrimpton and
Twiggy and bands like the Beatles
the kinks and the Rolling Stones pushed
further mod fashion overseas Maude was
becoming increasingly more colorful
thanks to his members increased affinity
toward pop art and psychedelics so
Twiggy and Shrimpton were often
photographed wearing bright colors in
the occasional bolt pattern designers
like Pierre Cardin Paco Rabanne and
Emilio Pucci were some of the first to
cater to the trend but as big-time
celebrities like Audrey Hepburn and
Jackie Kennedy began to seek out modest
styles larger fashion houses like Javon
she and Chanel began to capitalize on it
too
though Maude gave way to the
popularization of hippies in the late
60s a young paul weller frontman for the
band The Jam brought about his revival
in the mid 70s
and on into the 80s the revival invited
a new wave of teenagers into the scene
this time they were there purely to
model themselves after their musical
idols in other words it was less about
the ethos and more about the look and
it's time carried on musicians continued
to be at the forefront of each wave of
revival Oasis the Arctic Monkeys and
Jake bugg have all borrowed from the
mods contemporary fashion icons like
Alexa Chung tavi Gevinson and Tennessee
Thomas have followed suit as have
fashion designers like Marc Jacobs
Valentino and Gucci
as recently as 2018 Jean Paul Gautier
released a line that even paid tribute
to Pierre Cardin smaug collections
directly the 1960s were such an iconic
turning point for youth culture it's no
surprise that we continue to harken back
to it through fashion but at least now
as our current era of eclectic nostalgia
continues to bring Maude back into the
fold
we'll know what it stood for