Couture clothes for show: the Incorporated Society of London Fashion Designers promotional designs for British cotton, wool and synthetic fibres, 1940s–1960s

Abstract

Following World War II, the Incorporated Society of London Fashion Designers (INCSOC) collaborated with British textile manufacturers and the Board of Trade in a bid to stimulate the war-ravaged economy through export orders of British fashions and fabrics until the early 1960s. British couture was considered the ‘shop-window’ for a campaign that began with the founding of INCSOC in 1942 and the production of designs for the Utility clothing scheme. INCSOC worked with the International Wool Secretariat (IWS), the Cotton Board and the British Man-Made Fibres Federation producing designs using fabrics provided by the textile companies who frequently funded the cost of production. The fashion press helped promote the resulting designs, fashion shows and displays along with ready-to-wear and wholesale fashion companies where the bulk of potential orders lay. Royalty and celebrity were regularly photographed and filmed attending fashion shows or wearing British designs in British fabrics to endorse promotions involving INCSOC. Primary sources, including surviving examples of INCSOC couture, provide evidence here for investigating how often the designs, in each of the fibres, were made for the couturiers bi-annual collections or were just for showing through promotional campaigns.

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