#back to the future

The year is 2025. You’re in the movie theater watching Back to the Future IV. Mystical, twinkling music plays as some snot-nosed twerp climactically pulls a dusty tarp off of a Delorean in their grandfather’s old shed. Dramatically lit shots of aviators, orange vest, and Calvin Klein underwear. Down tempo Alan Silvestri theme swells. 40-year old men wearing “Re-elect Mayor Goldie Wilson” shirts whooping during the scene where CGI de-aged Michael J. Fox and Christopher Lloyd step out from the shadows. The sounds of a man in the back of the theater lighting himself on fire. That man is me. Einstein is on a hoverboard.

Finally! It took three movies, but finally! George McFly amounted to something.

You know, at this point, it’s just another Back to The Future movie. Part IV: American Gods. Mr. Wednesday is Biff and Mr. World is George. Or maybe the roles are reversed?

Historical Accuracy of Fashion In Period Films - Back To The Future 3

Now, this is a movie I completely forgot I could review and make a post about but then it was on TV the other day and I was beyond surprised by how accurate the (female) clothing was! As you may know, I know close to nothing about male historical fashion, so once again I’m going to have to stick to reviewing Clara’s and Maggie’s dresses. Also, another disclaimer: I’m not a dress historian so I don’t feel qualified enough judging very small details like the trims or patterns, but I’m going to try my best doing research and writing down what I do know.

In case you haven’t seen the movie, first of all, where have you been? And secondly, the movie takes place in 1885 and in the last scene, Clara wears a mid 1890s dress (1894-5?) because… time travel.

I’d like to start with Maggie’s dress right at the beginning of the movie.

First of all, it is very refreshing to see a Victorian farm wife not wearing a generic brown dress! You can clearly tell that it’s supposed to look 1880s bu the shape of the bodice, but she’s not wearing a bustle and obviously, it’s not as elaborately decorated. Both the lack of the bustle and the lack of any decoration is clearly due to the fact that she’s a lower class woman, a farmer, and has to work all day. I’m still very shocked in a positive way that Maggie actually wears something appropriate for the time! It’s a rarity in movies, unfortunately.

Let’s move on to Clara; Clara is a teacher and judging by her clothes, she’s at least middle-class. Her dresses aren’t as ornate as ones on fashion plates, but they’re still very accurate. Fashion plates, by the way, were supposed to show the fashion ideal but those were, much like haute couture is today, reserved for the very rich. “Street wear”, or fashion to wear on a daily basis by middle-class ladies was certainly modeled after those fashion ideals but didn’t have to be as out there. TL;DR Fashion plates aren’t a true depiction of what you’d see on the streets of a small town.

Here’s her first dress:

- corset ✔️

- hourglass shape ✔️

- bustle ✔️

- draping ✔️

There isn’t really anything to complain about. It’s accurate, it’s got the buttons down the front, a close-fitting hourglass-shaped bodice, a high neckline with a stiff collar, the drapes of the dress fall perfectly, it’s not incredibly decorated (not every dress was) but absolutely convincing!

Next we have this one:

And now I have to be a little nitpicky because other than this tiny detail I didn’t really find anything to critisize (if I’m even right because I’m not even 100% sure!) So, while doing research to make sure I don’t tell you any lies I barely came across any light colored day dresses, especially striped ones, because that actually seems to have been a pattern associated with sport dresses! It doesn’t even have an overskirt, which I don’t know if that’s super common in sport dresses but it does make them easier to care for and easier to move in. I found this example of a tennis gown from the same era and it looks very similar in pattern and style (although it does have an overskirt):

I did come across a few light colored dresses so I’m not saying they never existed or were worn in that context, it’s just something I noticed and I know that for example cream was a very popular color for sport outfits in men’s clothing, and when I researched women’s sport dresses I found they were mostly a cream/white with stripes! So, that being said, the rest of the dress looks amazingly accurate and I have nothing to criticize here either!

Her party dress:

This is a tricky one - for one, because I couldn’t find anything on a fashion plate or extant that looked similar to this, but I came across so many dresses with some details similar so this felt like it was pieced together from many different dresses. What I want to say is, while I personally couldn’t find anything that looked similar, it looks like something that absolutely could have existed in that time.

Normally, we’d associate evening wear with short sleeves but long sleeves existed just as much! But you can still tell it’s an evening dress by her lower neckline - that wouldn’t have been socially acceptable to wear during the day (totally not shading Enola Holmes here). Then we have the pleated front which could be a nod at the Aesthetic Dress Movement (think Edwardian-like fashion. It was actually the reason why Edwardian fashion looked the way it did!). I wasn’t so sure about the very lightweight looking fabric, but then again it’s an evening dress so I guess that works. And finally, a feature you unfortunately can’t see in the photos, the over skirt is draped asymmetrically - a very, very common way of draping the overskirt in 1885! Another little detail that I want to mention here even though it’s not technically fashion are the flowers. Flower language was a big trend in the Victorian era and I am terrible at recognizing flowers so I couldn’t even look up what the type of flowers mean BUT! Clara has the flowers pinned right above her heart which meant a clear declaration of love. Later, we can see those same flowers pinned above Doc’s heart, but when he comes to say goodbye to Clara, they’re in his pocket so she doesn’t see them and assumes he doesn’t love her. A great use of symbolism that completely went over my head the first time I watched the movie about a year ago! So glad I caught it this time.

Now to the last 1885 dress - this bright magenta one.

People were crazy about the new synthetic dyes that were invented during the 1850s and they dyed their dresses all sorts of different bright colors. So the color, while maybe a little dazzling in today’s eyes, is completely accurate to the period. The Victorians also loved contrasting shades of the same color on dresses! The purple (burgundy?) “vest” (which was part of the dress but made to look like a vest) and the sleeves are in contast to the magenta rest of it. I have nothing to criticize here, it looks great!

And lastly, we have this beauty:

It’s perfect and fits right into 1895. I don’t know what time they came from in that final scene (please tell me if I somehow missed it being said), but it looks like we’re in the mid 1890s, the height of the “typical 1890s silhouette”. The skirts are at its widest and so are the sleeves. I think the skirt could be wider, that’s why I first thought it might be 94 but the sleeves scream 95. Everything right down to the trimmings on the skirt and the yoke and the sleeves are accurate and there are countless examples of very similar outfits from 95 like this fashion plate:

Watching the movie, I was very surprised at how accurate these clothes were and I don’t know why I assumed they weren’t, but I was very pleasantly surprised. I also read that the designer Joanna Johnston already had experience working in this time period and she made all of the costumes from original patterns she could find of the time! Amazing! Wish we had more costume designers as dedicated as her.

BACK. TO. THE. 80s.

By Alex Stroker