The Modern Corset

The classic corset has been modernized, and with it has come some dramatic changes. Instead of whalebone new materials are being used. New methods of cinching, or even not cinching at all are now available. Mon dieu! Zippers?!?! Blasphemy!!!


Cinching on the front, the side, twice on the back, front-back-and-sides, zippers, buttons, chains, accessories, buckles, clasps and VELCRO!!!


Full corsets, half-corsets, breastless, backless, straps, strapless...
Mon dieu! What have we done?!

And the colours these days are dramatically different too. No longer is it just white or black. Brilliant colours of purple, brown, green, yellow, red, blue, pink and orange! And every possible colour in-between, plus colour combinations that make the mind boggle.


These days we don't cinch as much. We're much more realistic with regards to how we wear our corsets.


We've also developed a problem in which we tend to associate corsets with sex. Which is true, corsets do realate to sexuality. Always have, but in the older days (way back when corsets first became popular) they were meant to be worn in public underneath a tight dress, because it was fashionable to be thin in the waist and yet voluptuous elsewhere.
These days voluptuousness and thinness don't go together. You're either thin, average, voluptuous, or just plain obese.

And regardless of size corsets can be made to fit your size.

Furthermore, the way we decorate corsets have changed. Embroidered hearts, skulls, chinese writing, paisley, flowers. Small ornamental buttons in various shapes.

And then there's the new matter of weddings.

A long time ago corsets were commonly used during weddings also. These days however it has become popular again. Especially for people who like wearing a corset normally, and thus a wedding corset is also something that can be re-used, unlike the standard wedding dress where you wear it once and then never squeeze into it again.

Thus with a corset incorporated into the dress, or perhaps the dress designed in such a way that the entire dress can be re-used for other things, a person at least gets more than one use out of it.

On the opposite side of the spectrum from weddings is perhaps the most common use of corsets: pornography.

If you go to Google image search, type in the word corset, and turn the "SafeSearch" off you will end up seeing a lot of pornography (usually softcore) of women wearing corsets. Some of it will be fine art photography (high quality stuff), but a lot of it will be just plain smut.

And perhaps that smut is the biggest reason why corsets are becoming so popular. Sex sells. Pornography can sell almost anything, from viagra to cars, from cologne to clothes. It would be interesting to compare that advertising within Playboy Magazine to any other magazine and just see which magazine actually promotes the product better.

The headmistress of pornography and burlesque, the queen of corsets is none other than Dita Von Teese. Ms Von Teese has done more for popularizing the corset than any other modern celebrity. The corset is practically her trademark.

The combination of sexuality, the thinning aspect of corsets (its cheaper than liposuction), the popularity of its use in high fashion, gothic fashion, weddings and pornography, celebrity usage and movies like "Pirates of the Carribean" has made the corset the single most widely used fashion change of the 21st century.

People are even wearing them to work.

As time progresses, it almost seems like the feminist movement has relapsed.

Except technically it hasn't. Women aren't wearing corsets because men want them to wear corsets (although certainly that still happens, especially in the porn industry), women are wearing corsets because they WANT to (due to their own sexual fantasies or fashion beliefs).

So its not a relapse. Its sexual liberation starting to bloom.

Women are now sexually free to wear whatever they want. Fashion is simply mirroring their own desires.

And in this case, their fetishes too.

Mon dieu! What have we done?!?!:)