Reading patterns: dressmaking sections in women’s magazines in the 1960s and 1970s

Abstract

ABSTRACT In the 1960s and 1970s, many women’s magazines had special sections for home dressmaking. At a time when ready-to-wear clothing was expensive, the sew-it-yourself pages had an important function to win over competition among female readers. Teenagers read the magazines in search of clothing designs to copy in order to dress according to the latest fashion. Despite the importance of such special sections, they have only been given a marginal place in the history of the popular press and in cultural studies. This article examines and discusses the role of dressmaking sections in women’s magazines in Sweden in the 1960s and 1970s. Based on analysis of the two largest Swedish women’s weeklies and interviews with readers and editors, the study highlights women’s ‘utilitarian reading’, which combines textual, visual, and material literacy, and thus contributes to an overlooked area within women's studies, fashion and media history.