Considering how useful the pocket is, it’s not nearly widespread enough in modern clothing.
Pockets have been helping us for thousands of years. A perfectly preserved mummy of someone believed to have lived between 3350 and 3105 BC was found in the Ötztal Alps, in Italy, with an intact pouch containing useful items and tools sewn into his belt.
In the 16th century, pockets had to be concealed under clothing to outwit pickpockets and were sewn into belts and girdles.
It wasn’t until the late-17th century that pouches were rationalised into more functional pockets. These began to be sewn into men’s garments, but not women’s.
Women still usually had to fasten something to a belt under layers of skirts and petticoats, making such pouches much less accessible and therefore less practical. Sometimes they were even tied to clothing via ribbons – more precarious, as the ribbons could be cut.
And when clothing changed and became slimmer-fitting, it was not possible to hide the pouch under clothing: hand-held purses or reticules became the early handbag.
In the 16th and 17th centuries, women were suspected of using hidden pockets to smuggle potions and herbs to practise witchcraft.
Men were naturally alarmed to think that a love potion might be whipped from a pocket and administered to turn their heads and excite an ardour that might not have arisen spontaneously.
During the French Revolution, women were banned from having pockets at all, as they would be able to hide revolutionary material in them. Pocket-free women were less likely to be political activists.
During the world wars, women’s clothing had to become more practical, and pockets as we know them today were sewn into uniforms as standard. Both land girls and suffragettes had pockets and they became a symbol of feminism and autonomy.
Meanwhile, men’s suits evolved and had many different discreet pockets designed into them: a pocket for the watch and tickets, with deep pockets for coins and wallet. The Italian suit is famous for having sewn-shut pockets because a filled pocket spoils the silhouette.
Despite pockets’ usefulness, today’s designers stubbornly resist including them in women’s dresses.
Dua Lipa’s vintage Chanel dress at the Met Gala 2023 had pockets. And designer Christopher John Rogers sent chunky, knitted sets with enormous pockets down the runway just days before.
They are slow to materialise in non-celebrity milieus. However, pockets are making a comeback with Toast, Sophie Dundas and Boden, whose pocketed dresses have become a talking point this summer.
We don’t need purses, wallets or address books any more, as everything is on our phones. So if a dress has enough pocket depth for keys, a lipstick and a mobile, then we can go hands-free.
The sense of liberation when you can get in and out of cars without groping for a bag, and leave a room without staring at all the surfaces trying to remember where you left your bag, recalls the glorious freedom of being a schoolgirl. And this is quite apart from the fact that without a handbag you are much less attractive to a mugger on a motorbike.
And, talking of schoolgirls, the uniform at my school in Northern Ireland involved two pairs of pants.
The inner, more lightweight pair were white and designed to be washed regularly. The outer pair were navy blue and heavyweight to protect our little pelvises from the pre-climate-change biting cold. In those days, we wore knee socks, not the heavy black tights that are now de rigueur for almost every schoolgirl during winter.
These outer pants contained, as standard, a small pocket designed for the child to carry money and a handkerchief.
We all had them, and groping under our tunics to access the contents of our pockets was easy to do in a gainly manner.
School-uniform pants no longer come with integral pockets. But even if they did, they wouldn’t be big enough for anyone over size 10. Doesn’t some designer have the wit to bring out a range for adults?
I am certain they would be snapped up.
The Oldie September 2024
