History of the Bikini

The bikini was first worn centuries ago, although the modern history of the bikini is probably more of interest to us these days. Whether it was an “incey wincey teeny weeny yellow polka dot bikini” or not, most girls remember their first bikini, and most boys remember when they first became interested in watching them!

So how did we get from the old bathing suits at the turn of the 20th century (in those days you actually seemed to wear more clothes to swim than you did not to!), to a few triangles of cloth barely covering the essentials, and held together with bits of string?

History of the Bikini

The revival, shall we say, of the bikini is largely accredited to Louis Reard, a Frenchman, wouldn’t you just know it, with those “come to bed” eyes and accents which make you go all weak at the knees, “oh la la!”Anyway, Louis Reard was a car engineer but, for some reason was running his mothers lingerie boutique in Paris (don’t ask, well I don’t know anyway!).  Now then, another French bloke called Jacques Heim really was a fashion designer, and he came up with a bathing suit which he marketed as “the worlds smallest bathing suit”. So, ever practical, Louis Reard chopped it in half (through the middle) and marketed his creation as “smaller than the worlds smallest bathing suit”. He’d seen women rolling up their tops to get a tan on the beach and came up with this marvelous yet so simple idea.

This all happened around 1946. But guess what, the girls in those days weren’t quite like they are today, and poor old Louis couldn’t find anybody to model his bikini for him, not until he found Micheline Bernardini, who was a nude dancer so she probably felt well dressed. Not surprisingly the bikini was a great success, especially popular among men folk, and Micheline got around 50,000 letters – I bet some of those other models were kicking themselves! Nevertheless, sales around the world weren’t exactly flooding out. Nice girls just didn’t wear that sort of thing.

Movie stars the likes of Brigitte Bardot helped to turn Saint Tropez into the bikini capital of the world, and the Cannes film festival gave it exposure to a world wide audience, but some places simply banned the bikini, including many states in the US.

Famous Bikinis

Of course, the most famous bikini of them all was probably the one in Dr No, as Ursula Andress (or Ursula Undress, as she became known) emerged from the sea in her famous white bikini with knife attached! This bikini actually sold at auction in 2001 for more than $60,000 (not sure if the knife was included).

The Itsy Bitsy Teeny Weeny Yellow Polka Dot Bikini song really seemed to open the floodgates in the 1960′s, and it was no longer considered unsuitable for nice girls to be seen on the beach in a bikini, although personally speaking I still think that girls (or mostly women) of a certain shape should refrain in the name of common decency.

Interesting Bikini Fact

Well, I think it’s interesting anyway, did you know that an estimated 85% of bikinis never actually go in the water?