Happy Birthday Poly

Happy Birthday Poly? Now, what can that be about? I hear you ask. Well, apparently it is the 70th anniversary of the production of polyester, along with nylon the mainstay of women's uniforms and workwear design throughout the 60s and 70s and even 80s (and still today in one form or another, usually as a mixed fibre -but is not the same, is it?). I know this because I had the BBC on the radio yesterday in the morning and it was a whole feature on Radio Four here in the UK extolling the virtues of polyester in those shiny houseboats, overalls and uniforms I am sure many here can remember. Imagine my amazement on hearing a woman on the radio going on about the 'sensual feel' (if slightly sweaty and static ridden) and sound of polyester and how many housecoat and so on from that golden era she owns - it was almost fetishistic.

Now as you may have guessed, I have been focusing my energies mainly on getting the book finished - presently hovering around the 450 page mark and with a little more to finish and go in, I really now do envisage it being released into parts in some manner, the first of which may be ready as early as the week after next. The trouble is that now, along with my dodgy knee and my rather painful foot - that as you may remember some idiot ran over in his car - I now have a touch of severe man-flu (i.e. what my other half describes as a mild cold - but I know different). I have recruited a kind soul (or rather he has offered his help) who is presently aiding me with editing and proofreading some sections (as well as contributing some fresh ideas).

Despite these various pressures I have been able to put aside a little time to play with the blog. Last night, following on from the aforementioned radio show I lavished a considerable time chasing links to stuff about polyester in the hope of dredging up suitable imagery for today's blog entry. Strangely it all got sidetracked and although I found precious little suitable on polyester I did somehow stumble upon a series of French language blogs and a couple of other resources which I thought about showcasing today. But first of all I set out to tackle a couple of comments that had been appended during the past week to the last posting I made why back last Sunday. It all got a little carried away so I thought I'd include my ramblings here... so...

Referring back to the comments left on my last post: I think 'Anonymous' has hit the nail on the head when he (or she - I've learned my lesson, ha ha) says "a uniform has to be something that stands out as being shameful to wear" and that "the 'girl' should look childish, silly and not have a thread of modesty" - although I would personally substitute 'self-esteem' or 'self-confidence' for the word 'modestly'. 'Orage' also has a point when she reiterates that "females regard the most bizarre outfits as normal". If this were the 1950s or 60s or perhaps even the 1970s then this subject would not be quite so problematic and fraught with complication. It is instructive to note that many of the writers I admire and that work in the genre I'm interested in tend to set their tales in the Victorian era, turn-of-the-century (19th /20th) or the 1930s. Indeed when I first set out I myself was tempted to set the scene in the 1930s and 1950s.
One only has to read this edited extract (below) taken from 'The Family Doctor' 1898 (apparently) to grasp the problem.

“Sir, I had long intended to bring to your notice just how the system of keeping girls in short frocks as long as possible is an excellent one. There is no particular hurry needful in the dressing of girls as women and I'm sure that the mere fact of wearing a short frock and with having her hair kept unsophisticatedly coiffured is enough to keep the silly thoughts and inclinations of many girls of sixteen or so in check. There is something about the delicate combination of the dress of a young girl of thirteen or fourteen with the rather slender yet womanly figure and confined waist of a young lady of perhaps seventeen or eighteen - a woman in her own right - or even one approaching her early twenties that makes for a rare and rather lovely picture. I would argue that one can have no hesitation in punishing a girl dressed in this manner by means of the rod or whip, while I would suggest that one would hesitate in caning a young lady if her true age was clear and her appearance appropriately adult.
Two girls of my acquaintance are much marked upon on account of their short frocks and young appearance. Should it be desired to retain some extra element of modestly, then silk knickerbockers of a suitable colour may be worn reaching almost to the knee but the frock should be kept short enough to allow the trimming of the drawers to peep out. The latter perhaps might be decorated around the cuffs with ribbon bows so as to soften the severity of the costume while retaining the necessary formality so important in instilling good discipline. Despite the childish brevity of the skirt, there is no reason why a girl's neck and arms should be left to the ravages of the sun and the frock should therefore be high in the neck, long in the sleeves and may be quite constricting in both the thus discouraging any unladylike extravagance of movement and instead encouraging passivity and a sweet, submissive demeanour.
Although of nearly seventeen summers their stepmother is very careful of their looks in spite of their schoolroom dress. They are fair, each possessing a splendid mass of light brown hair falling over their shoulders and are generally dressed in blue, their skirts reaching two or three inches above their knees, displaying legs encased in black stockings. Their figures are invariably enclosed in regular rather closely-laced corsets which as many people used to say gives the promise of very slim tightly laced figures. Their hands and complexions are always carefully protected from injury from the sun or air”.

I don't doubt taking such an approach would have been efficacious at the time - but in the present era? But then the other 'Anonymous' (or is it the same one - that's the problem with being anonymous!) Talks about "old fashion school clothing like gym slips worn with a boater" and a whole new world opens up. Even if we satisfy ourselves with such styling as it actually would have appeared at the time there is much mileage to be had - even though a young lady dressed in that manner no matter her age, up to appoint at least, would not have raised an eyebrow in the relevant era. If we start playing with that concept a little, however - stretching the boundaries between what would have been expected in what would have seemed unusual even then, perhaps playing with different and perhaps inappropriate fabrics, incorporating unusual colours or extreme details of styling - then the scope becomes wide indeed. For example, if we're talking about developing a school uniform suitable for the intractable late teen continuing her education at home, under the tutelage of a strict governess or some other suitable personage, we have no need to limit ourselves to the usual muted school colours. 'Ware_simon' suggested in connection with the dress depicted in my last blog entry that it might benefit from being "in [a] pink candystripe", he also suggests the style be modified to allow for buttoning down the back (which of course with a little thought can be made most awkward the young lady concerned) and the addition of "a white satin sash tied at the back in a bow". And why not? (Thanks for the kind comment regarding the site by the way, Simon). I can imagine pillaging from a whole swathe of school uniform designs, perhaps even spread a couple of decades or so, cribbing from the best, or rather the most restrictive, oppressive and, yes, eye-catching, the most outstanding or unusual features - from a disciplinary standpoint.

And we don't even have to restrict our palate to school uniforms as such inspiration, for example if one takes the traditional school blazer then why not substitute it with a short cape based on the style that nurses used to wear but restricted to waist length - along with a short pleated skirt, white cotton gloves, a boater on the head, hair in pigtails and ribbons and her long coltish legs bare down to the little white ankle socks, their frilled turnover-tops threaded through with ribbon of a suitable colour and tied in a bow, it makes for a pretty picture of contrite shy embarrassment. Now factor in the discomfort of traditional full-bodied cotton interlock school knickers but manufactured with a layer of latex or PVC sandwiched between the inner and outer cotton (or why not nylon or polyester) layers, a tightly buttoned high stiff Eton style collar that barely lets her lower her chin tied around by a firmly knotted diagonally striped school tie, rubberised girdle and high-cupped longline bra or stiff longline corsellete. Perhaps underneath it all one might choose instead to put her in the traditional liberty bodice suspenders and black lisle stockings, a flat fronted candy striped school shirt blouse worn under a particularly shapeless gymslip and her breasts suitably restrained and flattened so that she doesn't even have the allure of her developing adult silhouette to fall back on, perhaps braces fitted on her teeth with or not she needs them. Then we have the possibilities inherent in the tightly belted gabardine school raincoat of old.

Then we have those "school dresses featured in the Australian soaps" mentioned by 'Cloudelover'. I'm sure that if the guardian or governess given control over a recalcitrant young Miss were to trace back the evolution of that styling a few decades or so he or she would come up trumps, with a little thought and imagination. Incidentally, thanks for the link, 'Cloudlover' - for those interested several entire galleries of examples of Australian soap opera school uniform dresses can be found in the Yahoo groups: Neighbours Uniform Babes 1 and Neighbours Uniform Babes 2. Although there hasn't been much activity for a couple of years on these two groups I think the galleries are still intact and perhaps a few of you out there might consider contributing a few pics of your own as I don't think either is limited to soap opera content necessary and a little activity might just get the ball rolling again on what at one point appeared to be a promising pair of groups (just click group titles or the picture top left or go to the Yahoo group listing on the right-hand sidebar). And all this brings me back to polyester again. Surely 100% polyester is the most obvious fabric choice for a practical, functional and hard wearing school summer dress such as might be envisaged.

By the way, anyone know of the magazine a couple of whose covers appear above. I came across them on one of the french blogs I mentioned but can't remember which - I'll get it sorted before next time. Translating from the French (or rather, having Google do it for me) it seems the author found them in a box in his house someplace and they date back to the 1970s / 80s (there are other examples on the blog) - but I thought I'd pretty much seen every spanking mag there is and has been and I have never seen or heard of that one!

To end: I feel I can safely say that all our thoughts go out to all those out there in Japan at the moment who are suffering. It has been one hell of a shock watching the news pictures over the weekend and a humbling experience for all of us, even those of us safely watching on TV, the way that nature can wipe entire towns off the face of the map in little more than a blink of an eye, despite all of mankind's much-vaunted technology and I wish them well.

That Old School Summer Dress

Just came across the blog 'Discipline Her' being "Tiffany Scarlet's spanking musings" on Wordpress.co (click to visit or check out the blog link list in the right hand sidebar). And I am jolly glad that I did, too as one of the first entries I happened to blunder upon – not necessarily the latest – featured this brace of charming shots taken from Blushes (I think it was – certainly one of that stable; though it might just be from Roue I suppose) that I did have in my collection at one time but that seems to been mislaid over the years; I have been looking for a replacement for some time in fact. The photo set this is taken from dates back to the mid to late 1980s though the room setting might almost suggest the 1970s.

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The dress design itself possibly dates from the late 1960s. Why I think this is that I once uncovered an old woman's magazine dating back to that period featuring a pattern for a near identical dress while taking up some lino in a house I was involved in renovating. It is the modest high collar that I think makes the thing work and though not perfect I still think it goes a long way towards forming the design basis for a school uniform summer-dress suitable for the older teen being educated at home or indeed held in a strict privately run institution.

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Any thoughts or suggestions? What improvements /changes might you make, if any?

Keeping Grown Women in School Uniform and the Search for a Suitable Governess Role Model

Those wonderful people at Aristasia - the folk behind that fine female disciplinary manual that I featured a while back - have made their television Documentary film, A Weekend at Miss Martindale's, available on Utube. Part 2 is particularly appropriate if good old fashioned classroom discipline is your thing - and I've kindly provided a link (just clic on the pic to the right-hand side above. Seeing an obviously quite mature woman treated as a naughty school child and meekly accepting it as if a matter of course got me to thinking yet again as to how appearances can influence behaviour, both directly and also indirectly - by affecting the way the individual is viewed and treated by others. For example 18-year-old Jessica here (right) is very much kept in school uniform by her guardian, full-time, seven days a week, 365 days a year. In many areas of the world she would be old enough to vote or even marry; but as seen here, in her school summer dress, or if you were to come across her in the winter months in her gymslip, starched white blouse, striped tie and blazer and with her hair tied up in pigtails, ask yourself this - would you be prepared to hand her any sort of responsibility? Would you treat her, as I'm sure she would prefer, as an adult or would you more likely be incline to have her stand in the corner with her hands on her head or sit her at a school desk and have her lovingly copy from the pages of some long-winded and tediously mind-numbing tome. Similarly, it would seem the most natural thing in the world to lecture this group on the left, but I know for a fact (because it's a scene from a new movie) that the young lady closest to us is 22 years of age. I recall once reading a magazine interview with one of the actresses that had played a schoolgirl in the film The prime of Miss Jean Brodie in which she told of how the various members of the movie company on the set and the canteen staff etc began to treat them differently when they were in the school uniforms they were required to wear and how they themselves had gradually subconsciously begun to fall into role as a result.

A similar argument can be put forward regarding the other side of the d/s relationship coin of course. A professional bearing and stern no-nonsense attitude is one thing and all well and good, but couple this with an appropriately authoritative manner of dress and a whole new dimension is opened up. This is one of the areas I've been researching on the Internet of late with regard to the events I have planned for INSTITUTIONALISED volume 3, when I eventually get round to writing it. My two young heroines, in the company of two other young women of similar age, are going to be under the care of a governess and a children's nurse or nanny for several months over the summer and although I have pretty much decided on the whole Victorian thing I've yet to decide exactly how these two women should appear. I've been hunting around for suitable images to use as a sort of role model so to speak. I came across this Gene Bilbrew drawing (right) which is one possible source of inspiration even if not in a Victorian mode.

But then again perhaps a governess should wear a uniform of some sort and certainly the nursery nurse must. Within the walls of a secure institution nothing could be more appropriate than a suitably authoritative and professional looking medical uniform (left) - perhaps that of the traditional ward sister or hospital matron; either would seem to endow the situation with a certain degree of legitimacy. One cannot overestimate the psychological effect and the impact produced. Can you imagine our Jessica, above, standing up to either of these two women?

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One can almost hear the words forming on their lips: “If you dare to disobey, expect punishment. From this moment on you are never to speak to me, unless I ask a question. Now, come hither young lady - drape yourself across my lap this instant, skirt up and knickers down! "

A Little Moving Picture Entertainment from Regulation Knickers.com and a School Summer Dress Reminiscence / Ramble

As my stated aim has always to keep this blog / site as primarily non-commercial (other than shamelessly promoting my own writing of course) I am currently only hosting one affiliated commercial site - although I may consider featuring one other at some future point should I come across something of genuine interest and value to my readership. Nevertheless today I was perusing the Regulation Knickers.com site (just click to visit or see the featured banner in the sidebar to the right or the other, larger one, at the foot of the page) in search of inspiration and found it in the form of a bottle green gymslip. Now admittedly you will have seen it before on this blog, albeit worn by another girl but I thought it a great excuse to feature a short movie offering for a change (only the second time I have featured moving content). It is a shame it is not worn by the girl being spanked but - while risking sounding a little too much like an advert for Regulation Knickers - it is a brilliant example of the combination of authenticity and imaginativeness that I find so stimulating about their stuff.

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One thing about their photos and films that never fails to catch my imagination is their incorporation of uniforms not only for the girls but often for the dominant character as well. The latter often well illustrates how the use of the different features that go to make up a uniform can be used to underline an authoritative / assertive role and 'air' - thus bolstering the self confidence and self esteem of the wearer - just as unusual detailing and juvenile features incorporated into the uniform of the girl serve to humiliate, belittle and undermine her confidence, thus underlining the required obedience and docility required of her. That juxtaposition serves to increase the psychological aspect of the domination of a girl's will in a synergistic manner - if she found it difficult to stand up for herself before, dressed in her humiliatingly childish school uniform, how much more difficult will it be for her to stand up to a dominant, stern governess dressed in the authoritative uniform of a hospital matron or ward sister of old or perhaps to a woman garbed almost as if to be a prison officer? Actually Regulation Knickers seem to be linked to the folks behind the old Disciplinarian site and who used to publish the magazines, Strictly Uniforms and Uniform International and they once featured (around 10 years ago now, I think) the most deliciously humiliating school summer dress ever to grace a well developed late-teen girl - green candy stripe, puffed shoulders, button through with short flared skirt, nicely fitted bodice with high-buttoning 'Peter Pan' collar and a plastic, buckled belt emphasising the waist, you get the picture? I have featured a couple of the pics from the series in a much earlier post (click HERE, or why not check through the blog archive and see what ells you may have missed?) In my eyes it just required a school badge with a suitably humiliating 'mission statement' as a motto embroidered on the breast pocket to be perfect (perhaps a long sleeved version with stiff buttoned cuffs and a button fastening belt of the same fabric as the dress might have something a little more going for it, but not much - hands up who thinks I'm just being 'picky' !) Incidentally; if I was to feature another commercial site, I'd love to feature Lupus Pictures / Rigid East - I love their stuff - but for now this is as commercial as I'm getting. Bye for now, I'm off to see Harry Potter at the IMAX, Waterloo tonight with the 'little woman' and I have to get to the gym and then get ready (grooming takes a little longer at my age).

School Uniform For the Recalcitrant 18-Plus Miss of Today? – Probably the Best Summer Dress Ever Pictured...

...But that's just my opinion - what's yours?

Taken from Strictly Uniforms magazine and published in the late 1990s, this series of pictures fits in nicely with the bulletin board discussions I came across recently, and that I have reported upon fairly extensively in previous posts. Some debate has raged whether or not school uniform should be retained for girls in their late teens (or even early 20s) still living at home, or a least under the supervision of some responsible older adult, despite in actuality having left school. In particular it has been related how one or two such young ladies have been trained in the art of knitting and sewing so that they might manufacture their own gingham dress - school summer dresses being considered difficult to obtain in the larger sizes. Well, clearly they are available, such an example is pictured here and to my mind, as such it is absolutely perfect for the job. Little details like the puffed shoulders, the high buttoned collar all serve to project the correct and much sought-after image of discipline and control - and it even incorporates a belt of the same material, neatly fastening at the front with a white plastic buckle, so, so nearly perfect, what else could you want?

Well...I guess...Perhaps long sleeves with buttoned cuffs would perfect the look, together with a little bit of white piping added here and there (perhaps around the edging of the cuffs, collar and breast pocket if there is one? Ensuring that it stays clean is something guaranteed to keep her mind concentrated on her appearance, you see. Makes one consider incorporating completely white collar and cuffs doesn't it?) and the provision of a breast pocket with some sort of school badge and motto boldly embroidered upon it.

The more observant of you have noticed that in actuality the thing is in a fetching vertical green and white striped material rather than gingham - ring a bell? Think about the institutional uniforms that the clinical-trial volunteers find themselves being put once having entered the experimental psychology department of that lovely little private and secure hospital depicted in INSTITUTIONALISED volume 1.

Here is,then, one half of that inspiration - albeit if realised in some practical hardwearing fabric such as nylon or polyester - the other half was furnished by those wonderful 1960s nylon dress-style ladies' overalls. To understand the institutional version that I envisage, you have to form something of an amalgam in your mind's eye of the two. Then we come to the lady holding the cane - in my mind at the time I first saw these I immediately saw her as being a governess - of course in the employ of their cruel stepmother; that's always been my way, but that's another story ( incidentally that was nothing like the actual storyline - but I have always tended to conjure my own , which I guess is why I'm sitting here doing what I'm doing today). No, not wanking, writing...I'm bloody writing - ok?