Soviet fashion of the first half of the 1950s: formation of a new model of consumption

Abstract

the article analyses textual and visual stories, is dedicated to the presentation of fashion images published on the pages of fashion and women’s magazines of the first half of the 1950s, the Study aims to determine vector dynamics and transformations of the Soviet fashion discourse (visual images and texts “fashion advice”) that occurred in the first half of the 1950s, the identification of the causality of these changes and trends socio-economic and political development of the country. When writing the article, the author was guided by the principles of historicism and objectivity. Work with historical sources was carried out using General scientific methods (analysis, synthesis, induction, etc.), as well as historical methods (problem-chronological, retrospective, comparative-historical). The source basis of the study was: Soviet fashion magazines - “Models of the season”, “fashion Magazine”, magazine for women – “Worker”, published during the first half of the 1950s. it was revealed That in the first half of the 1950s. in the official Soviet fashion discourse reflect changes in the standards of “fashion” consumption: the democratization of the presented models (manifested in the reduction in the cost of fabrics and decoration of clothing, expanding the range of everyday practices of using models, etc.); strengthening of ethical and didactic component in the rhetoric of fashion magazines. These processes indicated the replacement of the elite fashion concept presented in fashion publications in the 1940s with a more democratic concept of “Soviet taste”. The final design of this model takes place in the mid-1950s, but the beginning of the processes of its formation can be determined already in the first years of the 1950s. The specifics of the conceptual consumption models declared in the USSR were determined by the dynamics of the country’s economic development and the vector of the social policy pursued. The weakening of the mobilization regime in the first half of the 1950s, as well as increased attention to the problems of living standards of citizens, contributed to the democratization of the standard of “fashionable consumption”, declared in the domestic information space.