FASHION IN THE 70s
By Mark Nobes, chief editor


Disco Fashion
For ladies, long, semi- transparent and flimsy dresses - preferably designed by the American fashion designer Roy Halston Frowick - were worn with a necklace.

This is the Swedish model Ulla Jones in 1976 wearing a lurex halter top and matching flares.
Disco Pants and Hot Pants

Daisy Duke (Catherine Bach) Fair Use Image

ABBA introduced the World to a whole array of flashy costumes during the 1970s.

Jumpsuits
BELL BOTTOMS / FLARED TROUSERS
One of the most recognised fashion styles from the 1970s, here we see a fine example from 1971 of bell bottoms and hot pants. One of the finest examples of flare wearing can be seen with John Travolta in the disco-orientated movie Saturday Night Fever.
GLAM ROCK
Perhaps, the most memorable part of the glam rock scene was David Bowie's Ziggy Stardust character. Created in 1972, this became one of the most iconic fashion images of the 1970s. It coincided with the release of the concept album The Rise And Fall Of Ziggy Stardust And The Spiders From Mars, which went Platinum here in the UK.

Slade in 1973 wearing an early incarnation ofglam rock clothing.

Marc Bolan (T. Rex) 1973 (Public domain image)

Glam rock platform shoes
Tartan and Rolled-Up Jeans (UK)
In the UK, the Scottish pop band Bay City Rollers helped to popularise tartan and rolled-up/cropped jeans. I certainly remember many of the boys at primary school trying to replicate the style.
Tank Tops

70s Hair Styles

Afro Hair

During the 1970s, though, there was a fad for longer and bigger afro hair, which was popular with artists such as Jimi Hendrix, The Supremes and The Jackson Five. However, just as the style was becoming more mainstream, it fell out of favour with African-American people who started adopting braided hairstyles. Stevie Wonder wore one such style called the cornrow.

Pageboy Hair
This girl has a mid 70s pageboy hair style, and is wearing a top sporting medieval style wings which is belted across the middle. The style first became popular in the 50s and 60s.

Mohican - Punk Hair

Punk Fashion
There were more militaristic punk styles, darker gothic punk and glam and dance punk which used brighter colours. There were probably a couple of dozen punk subgroups in all.
Bondage Pants
These were made popular by designers such as Malcolm McClaren and Vivienne Westwood and were worn by the Sex Pistols, The Clash and Adam Ant, to name but a few. Mens drainpipe bondage trousers tended to be more baggy and crinkled than the smoother-fitting ladies design, and also had larger pockets with more metal parts such as chains and skulls etc.
Tartan
This was very popular in the UK (particularly red tartan), although the use of tartan as an anti-establishment symbol, no doubt, upset many traditional tartan-wearing clans in Scotland.
Circle-A Logo
A group of British punks in the 70s
JERSEY WRAP DRESS
The Jersey wrap dress was made popular by the Belgian born, American fashion designer Diane von Fürstenberg. After divorcing the German Prince Egon of Fürstenberg in 1972 (and losing her title of Princess), she started work on the wrap dress which was knitted from Jersey and became extremely popular during the mid to late 70s.
Both of the photos above feature original Fürstenberg wrap dresses. The one on the left is called Floral Italy and the other one has a painted leopard design.