Janet Dickinson swimsuit - help please!

Dilly Day

Dilly Day

Registered Guest
Would anyone be able to help put a date to this swimsuit please? I have searched for information about Janet Dickinson but can't find much.

The lady who gave me this swimsuit says that it belonged to her mother and dates from the 1940s - could that be right? The fabric has some stretch to it and has a ribbed (corded?) appearance - possibly rayon? There is boning on either side of the bust. There is a metal Aero centre back zip with Great Britain stamped on the other side of the tab.

I love the that the label warns you not to put it through the mangle!

Any help would be much appreciated.

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You could try looking up the registered trademark, I find that older ones aren't always listed but worth looking. If you don't know how to do that in UK let me know and I can point you in the right direction.

Off the top of my head, it's something like IPO.gov.uk It won't tell you how old the swimsuit is but it might give you a 'no older than' date, eg if it was registered in 1955 you know the suit isn't 40s.
 
Cestsibon said:
Just as a suggestion but I saw an AD for the 60s swimwear - what is the newspaper magazine database for the UK? we have newspapers.com so the UK equivalent website for searching published info? Start there ...? Museum Collections? British Vogue?
Click to expand...

Thank you for the suggestion - I will investigate!
 
MagsRags said:
It looks 40s or 50s to me. I searched "Janet Dickinson swim 1950s" and found a swimsuit in a New Zealand museum of all places, estimated as 1950s, and with a Janet Dickinson made in New Zealand label!
https://www.nzmuseums.co.nz/collections/3009/objects/83742/blue-swim-suit
No photo of the label, and of course their dating is an estimate. I wonder if the brand started out in NZ?
Click to expand...

Thank you, I found the NZ swimsuit too but went back to have another look after reading your post. What I missed the first time was that Janet Dickinson had a collaboration with Berlei so that might give another lead.
 
You could try looking up the registered trademark, I find that older ones aren't always listed but worth looking. If you don't know how to do that in UK let me know and I can point you in the right direction.

Off the top of my head, it's something like IPO.gov.uk It won't tell you how old the swimsuit is but it might give you a 'no older than' date, eg if it was registered in 1955 you know the suit isn't 40s.

Ruth

Thank you - I hadn't thought of that so will give it a try.
 
What would a mangle be called in the US? I had one back in the 80s which I painted, added a wooden shelf at the bottom and used as a drinks trolley! I loved it but sold it when I moved into a second floor flat as there was no way it was going up all those stairs! Shame really as I would love it in my house now.
 
When I was a little girl in rural Illinois, Monday was wash day. My mom used a hand cranked wringer washer that looked something like THIS. Picture it with a tub on either side - you wash, you wring, you rinse, you wring, and then you hang it all on the clothesline. For a family of six.
 
I looked through my subscription to a British newspaper database and found something like one or two mentions of Janet Dickinson in 1949, but a great many more from 1950 through to the early 1960’s, after which I stopped looking because the suits were by then quite unlike yours. A 1954 ad touted Janet Dickinson swimsuits and noted the name was “a new name with new styles in swim suits.”
 
We had a mangle briefly in the U of L costume shop about 1980-81. Ours was a contraption much like a wringer, but was a pressing machine for flat linens such as sheets & tablecloths. It ironed as it rolled. It was awful to work with and it could burn your arms if you weren't careful.
 
So cute! I own a few vintage swimsuits similar to yours! Seems late 50s to me, maybe early 60s, based off the cut, interior, and buttons.
 
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