L’Americaine: French Perceptions of American Style, 1920-1939

June 10, 2021 @ 7:30PM GMT/3:30 PM EST

“My Transatlantic friends are always welcome; they have what I call ‘the three f’s’: figures, francs and faith! That is why I like dressing the Americans,” famed nineteenth century couturier Charles Frederick Worth purportedly said about his American clients. This comment reflected the accepted stereotypes of American women that persisted following the First World War—they were seen as healthier and wealthier than their French counterparts. In the 1920s and 1930s, no one challenged the primacy of Parisian fashion; however, it was wealthy American consumers who played a key role in supporting and upholding this authority. Yet, despite this centrality of American patronage of French fashion, little scholarly attention has been paid to French perceptions of American fashionability during this period. An examination of French fashion magazines of the interwar period reveals that fashion was a key component of the way in which the French portrayed Americans. These representations of American women—called l’Américaine,” a counterpart to the famed “Parisienne”—were not universally positive; they identified differences in the way American women approached romance, and pointed out the ways wealth did not translate to elegance. For French readers of these magazines, “l’Américaine” acted as a foil, an alternative both simultaneously aspirational and aberrant.

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