Fashion design and Clothing-01: History of Fashion Design

 CHAPTER ONE: HISTORY OF FASHION DESIGN 

   The history of fashion began in the the early days when humans started wearing clothes, clothes made up of animal skin, plants/ leaves, fur, grasses, tree barks and so on. These clothes were either weaved or tied together to form a piece of cloth. The very first material used for fashion design is the natural fiber from animals and plants, fibers such as: wool, cotton, leather, silk, flax etc. The history of clothes dates back to 120,000 years ago, this discovery were found in a cave in Morocco with traces of animal skin and bones. Although humans started wearing clothes at 170,000 years ago…Humans came up with the idea of clothes for different purposes as to cover their nakedness, to keep warm due to exposure to cold, for easy identification( such that a particular tradition or culture can be easily identified by the mode of dressing) etc. Now, using Adam and Eve as a case study here, it is most likely right to say Adam is the first man to make his own clothes to cover his nakedness after eating the forbidden fruit which opened his eyes, both Adam and Eve made clothes out of animal skin to cover their nakedness. The first humans to make clothes are the Neanderthal man, he existed from about 200,000 BCE to 30,000 BCE. During this period, the earths temperature changed it rose and fell creating a sequence of ice age mostly at the northern region of Europe and Asia where the Neanderthal man lives. Yes! Neanderthal men were well adapted to the cold climate of their land but they needed a material or linen to keep their bodies warm. These men learnt how to make tools from stones and woods, which they used for hunting, they hunted animals like: bears, musk oxen, deer and other hairy mammals. Along the line, the Neanderthal’s saw the fur and thickness of the animal skin and thought upon themselves to weave them into piece of cloth.

       These clothes are made by hand, they are mostly simple and easy to wear. The world oldest dressed traced it way back to Egypt in 1913 named ‘Tarkhan Dress’. Study have proved that this dress and it’s fine linen dates between 3482 and 3103 BCE making it the works oldest intertwined material of all times. This finely designed dress was found in an Egyptian Tomb 5,000 years ago, hidden before it ever came to light. In Ancient Rome and Egypt fashion designing evolve, fashion was part of their culture it also acts as status symbol. The rich dressed in expensive attires that were colorful and well designed, while the poor dressed in cheap attires with dull colors. The Egyptians were well known for linen material which were found in graves during the Neolithic era. They believed that the gods were clothed in linen before their existence on earth.

    In our next chapter, we will look deep into the growth of fashion designing and clothing