Fashion Dictates Stride: The Hobble Skirt
Hobble skirts are an unsung result of the advent of flight. Historian Alison Matthews David speculates that the style may have been inspired by one of the first women to fly in a plane, Mrs. Edith Berg, in 1908. The Wright Brothers flight intrigued her, so she asked if she could take a ride. She became the first publicized ‘passenger’ on a flight. To keep her skirts from flapping about and catching in the mechanical systems, she tied it up with twine.
Early versions of hobble skirts had similar ties around them, and a 1910 New York Times article called them “aeroplane skirts,” so David’s conclusions may be valid. The style gave women a distinctive silhouette, curvy through the middle and narrow at the bottom. The skirt was adapted into high style fashion meant to evoke the exotic ‘harem’ styles popular at the time.
