1. Boho - The Fashion History Of Bohemian Style
Bohemian style has, for over 200 years, been an exotic alternative to the accepted fashions of a
given period. Generally associated with artists, writers, and intellectuals, bohemian culture
incorporates Gypsy, and various ethic clothing styles, as well as historical costume.
Bohemian style consists of loose, colorful clothing and has appeared as boho chic, hippie style, and
Aesthetic dress. With their long flowing hair and rich, though threadbare fabrics, bohemians stand out
in a crowd representing a colorful counterculture based on creativity, poverty, and an indifference to
social structures and traditions.
The Bohemians, as a counterculture, appeared in France after the French Revolution. Deprived of the
former system of patronage, where wealthy clients supported the arts, artists were plunged into
poverty. Many took up a nomadic life style, lived cheaply, and wore worn out and unfashionable or
used clothing.
Formerly, an artist was seen as a skilled and talented crafts person. But the Romantic Movement of
the late 18th century rejected the confines of bourgeois life and the former importance placed on
reason, to embrace the imagination.
A new cult of personality emerged with the artist as hero and individual style expressed in the way
one dressed. An artist became a special type of person, not merely a crafts person, but a kind of
eccentric genius whose creativity was displayed in the way they lived and looked. The artist himself
(or herself) was a piece of art.
People compared the new artistic types to wandering Gypsies and believed that Gypsies originated in
Bohemia, an area of Eastern Europe and the Balkans. So, they came to refer to artists and
intellectuals as Bohemians. (Gypsy was a European term for the Romany people, an ethnic group
with Indian origins who had migrated north. The word Gypsy, derived from the word Egyptian, which
many thought the actual home of the nomadic people who were often social outcasts that lived
outside the mainstream.)
By the 1830's, the French Bohemian art crowd and the Romantics embraced medieval and oriental
clothing styles. With their colorful fabrics, long flowing hair, and wide brimmed hats, the artistic culture
did come to resemble Gypsies.
The novelist Henri Murger wrote tales about the people that he called bohemians, centering on a
group of artists and intellectuals in threadbare coats, old shoes, and a general look of dishevelment.
The stories inspired Puccinni's famous opera, La Boheme.
Bohemian style evolved into a cult of the individual, a person whose very appearance became a work
of art with carefully planned outfits and accessories. The word bohemian suggested a sense of
arcane enlightenment, sexual freedom, and poor personal hygiene.
Bohemian life rejects materialism, private property, and centers on creativity and communal living.
Often associated with the use of drugs and alcohol, bohemians ignore social convention, centering
their lives on art.
In the 19th century, the Aesthetic Movement became a type of bohemian life style. The Aesthetics

2. rebelled against the rigid social constraints of the Victorian era and embraced a style based on the
clothing of the past, particularly medieval dress and oriental designs.
Beliving that the mass production of the Industrial Revolution was dehumanizing, the Aesthetics
strove to encourage the old techniques of the Middle Ages with individually crafted goods. Clothing
was loose and soft, using fabrics colored with organic dyes and decorated with hand embroidery. The
Pre-Raphaelite artists of the day rejected corsets, crinolines, and the stiff bodices and restrictive
clothing of Victorian fashion.
Bohemian style, now referred to as boho chic, has come down through history, reappearing as
beatnik style and in the hippie culture of the 1960's. For 200 years, bohemian style has consisted of
several fashion elements.
• Loose, flowing clothing made of natural fabrics
• Less restrictive garments worn without corsets, bras or other restrictive elements
• Loose, flowing hair
• Colorful scarves worn at the neck, on the head, or instead of a belt
• Peasant style clothing including tunics, loose trousers, boots, and sandals
• Used or worn clothing
• Oriental elements including robes, kimonos, an the ethnic designs of Persia, India, Turkey, and
China
• Mixing historical elements of medieval clothing with ethnic styles
• Layering
• Matching of garments in a nontraditional manner, such as mixing prints, or unusual color
combinations
• Multi strands of beads, several bangle bracelets, and the wearing of unusual, hand crafted, or
unmatched jewelry
• Large dangle or large hoop earrings
• Broad brimmed hats
• Patched clothing
• Paisley, flowered fabrics, ruffles, lace edged sleeves
• A general disregard for tidiness and uniformity of dress
• A look of contrived dishevelment
The Rainbow Gathering is an annual meeting of like minded individuals with a bohemian bent that
reject capitalism and materialism and embrace utopian ideals, the creative life, environmentalism, and
diversity.
The Hippie Movement of the late 1960's incorporated bohemian ideals. Centered on creativity of life
and dress, hippie style included elements of historic costume, ethnic dress, and a rejection of
mainstream life. To the right, in a clip from the Monterey Pop Festival of 1967, Country Joe and the
Fish perform to a crowd dressed in classic hippie style.

3. Greenwich Village, New York or The Village was a gathering place for impoverished artists and
writers in the 20th century, a haven for the creative communtiy as a distinctive minority group.
The Left Bank In the early 20th century, the Montparnasse area of Paris France was a hub of
creativity that attracted artists, writers, and intellectuals. Here, people like Marc Chagall, Ernest
Hemingway, Henri Matisse, and others were able to live cheaply, meeting in bistros and restaurants
to share ideas.
La Boheme and the Musical Rent - The musical Rent is based on Puccini's opera La Boheme. The
story revolves around a group of artists living the bohemian life and their struggles with poverty and
disease.
Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle's first short story featuring Sherlock Holmes included Doctor
Watson's description of the famous fictional detective's 'bohemian soul.'
Paul Poiret - The early 20th century fashion designer reworked a variety of ethnic designs for
Western fashion. His use of elements of Russian peasant costume, Middle Eastern, oriental, and
historic dress introduced bohemian concepts int high fashion that eventually bled into mainstream
fashion.
William and Jane Morris - William Morris was a designer who created alternative textiles for clothing
and interior design, known for his involevment in liberal socialism, historic preservation and known as
an early environmentalist. He also designed clothes for his wife, Jane Morris, a model who became
an icon of the Aesthetic and Arts and Crafts movements in her loose, medieval style dresses and
abundant long hair.
Dorelia McNeill was a model for the artists Gwen and Augustus John in the late 19th and early 20th
centuries. Augustus and Dorelia lived a gypsy life in a caravan while he painted her in long, loose
skirts and scarves as they lived in a personal bohemian utopia.
Basically unchanged for many years, bohemian style came to be associated with young people
hoping to distance themselves from the materialistic culture of past generations. Bohemian style gave
birth to more modern counter culture styles. Beatniks, with their black turtle necks and striped shirts
took on a more austere tone of dress. Hippie style introduced a note of childhood into the mix by
incorporating cowboy and Indian styles as well as short, girlish skirts.
But as mass media embraced bohemianism, one wonders if the term is still viable. When a counter
culture goes mainstream, the style can no longer be viewed as alternative.
When discount stores sell peasant skirts, and fashion magazines offer expensive designer made
bohemian style garments, the nature of the bohemian life has become a cultural norm, and no longer
unique and specific to a particular group.
Though fashion often embraces boho chic, the life itself - the yearning for individual freedom, the
rejection of modern materialistic concepts, the dream of utopian ideals, and production of hand
crafted goods remains a powerful alternative to mainstream culture.
All photographs, unless otherwise noted, from wikimedia commons, creative commons and are in the
public domain due to age.

4. caftans for women