Feb
History of the Seamed Stocking
I really love seamed stockings. I like the way they look and I feel sexy when I wear them. They are hard to find in your regular lingerie store, and this made me wonder why? I guess they are a vintage fashion, and you don’t see women wearing them everyday. In fact, they are almost non-existant in regular everyday use. This led me to think about the history of the seamed stocking.
Reading about stockings, you will learn that they date back to the time of the ancient Greeks. Throughout time, people have worn all kinds of stockings, mostly knitted from cotton or silk. It was in the 19th century though that machine-made stockings became popular with women, along with shorter skirts.
In the 1930s, stockings and hosiery began to change for two reasons. First came a synthetic fibre we’re all familiar with known as nylon. By the end of the World War, nylon had completely replaced the use of silk in women’s stockings. Second was a circular knitting machine that allowed for the creation of stockings in one piece. This is what ultimately led to the disappearance of the seam in the back of stockings.
Before the existance of the circular knitting machine, stockings had to be knitted as a flat piece and then sewn together into a tube shape. If you can imagine, they were sewn together much like any other piece of clothing is. This meant that they were sewn to fit specific sizes and made to fit the leg. It also meant that there was a seam down the back of the stocking.
After the disappearance of the seam, we see changing fashions push a move towards pantyhose. With short skirts becoming popular, and the concept of showing some stocking no longer acceptable, pantyhose were now the order of the day.
And that pretty much brings us to modern times. Fortunately, you can still purchase stockings with seams but for the most part, these are not authentic. These are modern stockings done on a circular machine with a seam added to the back. There are apparently some places that still produce seamed stockings on vintage machinery, but it is such an involved process! The machines are enormous and slow, each stocking has to be seamed individually, and it seems you lose a lot of product to defects.
Now you know why stockings used to be seamed, and why the seam eventually disappeared. Maybe it’s the rarity of the seam nowadays that makes it so sexy!
