‘The day I stopped the traffic!’
Ellie Arlen recalls her love affair with black tights in the Sixties – and their effect on passers-by!
can still remember it: the squeal I of brakes that followed the first time I stepped out wearing black tights... a wolf-whistling bloke on a bike was so riveted, he narrowly avoided wobbling into the path of a double-decker bus! In the Swinging Sixties, black tights with mini-skirts were the height of fashion.
From the minute I’d seen them (probably on the legs of Mary Quant) I was smitten. How exciting they seemed and what an amazing job they did in slimming your calves and creating the illusion your legs were twice their natural length!
Back in the Fifties, before tights came in, Hollywood dancing stars such as Ann Miller had to have their stockings stitched to their panties to avoid exposing too much sexy flesh on screen. When tights hit the market, we snapped them up, because wearing shorter skirts, yet avoid showing stocking tops and suspenders (a real taboo) had become a headache. I was mortified when a friend pointed out that I’d shown mine while dancing to
Roll over Beethoven...
Tights allowed hemlines to creep even higher, yet freed us to dance with abandon, and to sit with one leg flung over the other, instead of having to demurely clamp our knees together.
‘Dancing stars such as Ann Miller had their stockings stitched to their panties’
At first, we were in a quandary about where to wear our panties. Over the top (looking like Batman’s Robin) was my preferred choice. Many of us couldn’t entirely put our faith in their elasticity, and saw our panties as a safety net to prevent tights drooping down as far as our knees (in what later became known as Nora Batty-style). But it wasn’t long before ‘underneath’ won the day – not only because it was more hygienic but because over the top (especially with black tights) looked plain silly.
It’s now way past 50 years since I accidentally stopped the traffic with my first pair of black tights, but my love affair with them has never wavered. Like many women who don’t feel comfortable in trousers, I’ve lived in them every year continuously from September to the end of May. And I’ve learned to appreciate the fact that the older one gets, the more a pair of 60 deniers can conceal a multitude of sins!
For thousands of women of my generation, a nip in the air and the onset of autumn means no more searching for skirts that cover ageing knees, yet don’t droop frumpily around the ankles. We can pull on our trusty black tights and feel confident to face absolutely any occasion!