Clara's 1928 Cape and Dress

In the 1920s, fashion designs changed radically. Instead of simply changing the shape or decorations on the dresses, the entire approach to fashion design changed. It became socially acceptable to wear short skirts — and even pants — and the corsets of the past ended up in the attic. This dress is a little outside the normal silhouette that was iconic in the 20s: a straight-down "flapper" dress like Clara's other 1920s dress here. However, as popular as the flapper dress was, other styles were worn

Clara’s dress is from about 1928, and has long, straight sleeves, a plain bodice with a simple collar, and a knee-length flared skirt. The plain styling of the dress is dressed up with a little bow and a ribbon belt with a shell buckle. A little half-cape provides style, but not much warmth.

Clara also has some soft “bar” style silk slippers.  "Bar" shoes were simply shoes with a strap, making dancing a lot easier. The strappy heels of the 1920s are pretty neat shoes, many with intricate crossed straps. In this case, Clara's are rather plain to match the simple style of this dress.

To finish the outfit, Clara has a floppy-brimmed cloche-style hat, with a cute ribbon and some little roses for trim. This style of hat was worn fashionably when it was pulled down to just above the eyebrows, covering the forehead.

The original dress is dark green with a red ribbon belt. The cape is the same shade of green, with a matching red lining and buttons.

The shoes are white silk shoes with peach trim

The hat was baby pink with rose pink stripes, and white and pink roses.

Popular colors in the 1920s included a lot of brown, ivory, and pink. Light yellow, and many shades of green were also prevalent. Here are some colors found in 1920s clothing:

To print Clara's outfit, use this PDF file:
Clara's Dress 35 (749k)

Clara is a free, printable paper doll. Clara will continue to be available on this blog as long as I post new fashion pages for her. You can read the introduction for the Clara paper doll here.

To print the Clara paper doll, use this PDF file:
The Clara Paper Doll (745k)