The Story of the Bikini

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BIKINI - was introduced 77 years ago on this day. The bikini first shown at a fashion show in Paris. Was named after the Bikin Atoll, the site of the nuclear-weapons testing site in the Marshall Islands. Here is the story behind the Bikini as we know it... A THREAD

A two-piece swimsuit primarily worn by women. One piece on top that covers the breasts, a second piece on the bottom: the front covering the pelvis, usually exposing the navel & the back generally covering the intergluteal cleft & a little, some, or all of the buttocks

In the summer of 1946, Western Europeans enjoyed their first war-free summer in many years. French designers sought to deliver fashions that matched the liberated mood of the people. Fabric was still in short supply,

In an endeavour to resurrect swimwear sales, two French designers – Jacques Heim and Louis Réard – almost simultaneously launched new two-piece swimsuit designs in July 1946.

Heim launched a two-piece swimsuit design in Paris that he called the atome, after the smallest known particle of matter. He announced that it was the "world's smallest bathing suit."

Soon after, Louis Réard created a competing two-piece swimsuit design, which he called the bikini. He noticed that women at the beach rolled up the edges of their swimsuit bottoms and tops to improve their tan.

On 5 July, Réard introduced his design at a swimsuit review held at a popular Paris public pool, Piscine Molitor, four days after the first test of a US nuclear weapon at the Bikini Atoll. The newspapers were full of news about it & Réard hoped for the same with his design

Réard's bikini undercut Heim's atome in its brevity. His design consisted of two side-by-side triangles of fabric forming a bra, and two front-and-back triangular pieces of fabric covering the mons pubis and the buttocks, respectively, connected by string.

When he was unable to find a fashion model willing to showcase his revealing design. Réard hired Micheline Bernardini, an 18-year old nude dancer from the Casino de Paris.

He announced that his swimsuit, was "smaller than the world's smallest bathing suit". Réard said that "like the [atom] bomb, the bikini is small and devastating". Fashion writer Diana Vreeland described the bikini as the "atom bomb of fashion".

Bernardini received 50,000 fan letters, many of them from men.

Despite the garment's initial success in France, women worldwide continued to wear traditional one-piece swimsuits. When his sales stalled, Réard went back to designing and selling orthodox knickers.

Increasingly common glamour shots of popular actresses and models on either side of the Atlantic played a large part in bringing the bikini into the mainstream.

During the 1950s, Hollywood stars such as Ava Gardner, Rita Hayworth, Lana Turner, Elizabeth Taylor, Tina Louise, Marilyn Monroe, Esther Williams, and Betty Grable took advantage of the risqué publicity associated with the bikini by posing for photographs wearing them.

It did take all the way to the end of the 1950's for the bikini to rise to fame. And not until the late 1980's was it a substantial part of global swim wear sales at ~20% of global sales.

Today the Bikini is a widely accepted garment. Part of the increased consumption of bikinis and swimwears can be attributed to influencers who promote and endorse various brands around the year.

As of today in 2023, the global swimwear market was valued at US$22,6 billion with a compound annual growth rate of 6.7%

According to @goop the 2023 swimwear trends are yet again moving away from the small bikini styled garments, to more one-pieces and larger pieces. Like everything else in fashion the trends oscillates between the old and the new.