Dress-making was not as old as mankind as had been previously thought. It turned out that food-gathering was our ancestors’ first priority. The need for shelter came in second. Clothing, generally regarded today as mans third basic need, came in much later.
The jury is still out there as to how late it was when our ancestors finally decided to make and wear clothes. Initial findings say it was some time around 650,000 years ago when people thought it was good and healthy to wear something to protect themselves against the rain, the wind and the sun.
The experts were also uncertain if the decision to wear clothes included the avoidance of stares from the others. That reason might just be plain conjecture. We still have groups of people, old tribes living in present-day jungles, who consider personal modesty a non-issue.
What is certain, though, is that the manufacture of clothes had evolved into one of the worlds biggest multi-billion dollar industries. It had spawned its own specialized idioms, created fashion movements, made up its own philosophy and quirky politics, and created its own star personalities. It had even overlapped into the equally hyper entertainment industry. But thats another story.
Our story is about the dying art of dress-making.
Clothing materials
It had been a long while since people used fur and leather from animals, as well as leaves, barks and hemp from plants as clothing. Wearing was simple: either these were tied to the body or were wrapped around the backs of the wearer.
Much later, the craft of weaving was developed and the use of hand needles to stitch fabrics together arose some 40,000 years ago. The making of clothes went a notch higher.
In China, silk was discovered around 3,000 ago, almost around the time the Egyptians found the use of linen. In Europe, wool was first used in Greece and later in Rome. It is remarkable that we still use these materials today.
The art and the craft
Even then, the craft of tailoring was slow to come by. Everything then was done by hand — thread-making, weaving, and sewing. The techniques discovered and developed painstakingly over hundreds of years were handed down from generation to generation.
Alongside these, almost every housewife had a dress-making box at home. This box contained pins and needles, scissors, threads, and a tape measure. These were the tools mothers used in simple clothes-making and repairing techniques, as well as using them in teaching their little girls sewing lessons learned from their own mothers.
When the Industrial Revolution flourished in Europe, the textile industry was the first to be mechanized. This freed the people from the tedious job of making threads and fabrics which in turn are sewn into clothes.
Mass production
This was the beginning of the decline in the art of making clothes. These were the days when dress-makers become famous and people want to wear their creations. To make more of these clothes, more assistants and seamstresses were hired. Later, there were armies of their garment workers all over the world.
Nowadays, a piece of clothing is considered a consumable item — sold and bought over the counter no different from a can of soda or a bag of potato chips. This is because mass-produced clothes are less expensive now than the labor to make it.
There maybe a handful of traditional tailors lurking around. But they are getting harder and harder to find. They are, sad to say, a dying breed.
Another group of old-fashioned dress-makers are found in countries where strict traditions still dictate the make and form of their clothes. Sadly, their days may be numbered. In a fiercely traditional nation as Tonga, one sometimes sees men wearing modern T-shirts together with their traditional Tongan wrap-around skirt called tupeno.
It is a strange mix, but today’s Tongan men probably think they look better in it than before.