Skirt wearing boys in Japan

[Damon]

At the risk of seeming like a Jeremiah... in the 'Swinging 60s' it did seem like the day of skirts for men was dawning. You could buy skirts for men in Carnaby street. David Bowie wore dresses. Kaftans were quite common. My wife made matching ones for me and our 4 year old son. I wore mine a few times about the house but hadn't the courage to wear it to a party where, to my shame, another man was wearing one. Our son wore his a bit but objected to it being ankle length and hindering him. After my wife cut it to just above his knees and added a belt and pockets he wore it willingly, and no problem with his one friend. In Bentalls Department store in Kingston they sold dresses for boys in the boys Department, for only around twice the price of similar dresses in the girls department. We bought him one that looked like a shirtwaister dress and came with matching briefs and he wore it quite a bit, alternating with the shortened kaftan. James Laver the curator of the costume department at the Victoria and Albert museum forecast on TV that by the year 2,000 most men would be wearing skirts and dresses designed for men. Still waiting for that. My son started school and wore his Bentalls dress on the weekend in front of two new friends from school. They said something and that was the last time he wore it or the shortened Kaftan. Though later he got a kilt like his dad and that was never a problem.

[denimini]

Jerimiah or Methuselah, my brother wore a kaftan when he married his first wife and that was a long time ago, probably half a century.

[Grok]

When I was researching the shift towards Western styles, I came across what might have been. Early on, a few Japanese suggested adopting clothing styles from other East Asian countries. Japan could have well have had dual sartorial revolutions, at the same time.

[Grok]

Recently watched Midway. The Japanese had their own distinctive uniforms. The Japanese had borrowed from the West, and then made the garments their own.

Reminds me of an ad I saw for a "Celtic sarong."

[Grok]

Andon hakama. An undivided garment, that has been described as a sort of tube skirt.

[Grok]

Clip from You Only Live Twice[/url].

[Grok]

Note-when the Japanese borrowed Western clothing styles, they borrowed based on Western gender rules.

BTW, note the difference in dress between the woman in a kimono and the woman in the Western style dress. Based on strikingly different and unrelated clothing traditions. This may be something that tends to inhibit borrowing from unrelated cultures...because the clothing has very different appearance, compared to what one is used to.

[shadowfax]

Clip from You Only Live Twice.

The Little Nellie autogyro, as flown in the film, by Wing Commander Ken Wallis.
I once saw it up close in a museum.