Undressed: 350 years of Underwear in Fashion exhibition documents history of undergarments

The most intimate and traditionally private parts of history have been made public at an exhibition exploring the evolution of underwear at the Queensland Museum in Brisbane.

Undressed �" 350 years of Underwear in Fashion showcases a range of rare undergarments from the 1600s through to the present day, including a pair of royal knickers.

"When you first walk in it can be very confronting," said Michael Merandy, the museum's senior textile conservator.

"You see the woman wearing a very tight fitting corset and a pannier and you immediately think, 'Gosh, that must have been very uncomfortable and very hot to wear'.

"Look at where we've evolved to now, you don't need to wear as much, it really can be very skimpy.

"Technology allows us to wear underwear that is comfortable to wear against the body, that's cool, that basically helps to keep things in place without all that discomfort."

Centuries old corsets on show

Undressed features a range of corsets, including a rare iron corset (circa 1600), which was used to help women who had done lasting damage to their spines from lacing their corsets too tightly.

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However, contrary to popular belief, most women who wore corsets did not tighten their laces to the extreme.

"The whole idea of corsetry and waist sizes has been a bit of a phenomena," Mr Merandy said.

"The average Victorian waist size was actually 22-23 inches, not the tiny 18-19 inches that people read about in the literature."

"Women weren't really walking around London or Sydney or even Brisbane fainting every minute because of tight lacing."

Each of the corsets on display come from Europe, but historical evidence shows Australian women also wore corsets.

"Even though we were so far away from Europe where all these beautiful undergarments were made, Brisbane women were still very fashionable," Mr Merandy said.

"Brisbane had a corsetiere in the city, her name was Madame Dunkerton and that's where you would go and have your corsets made there."

Some women wore six petticoats at a time

Among the other highlights of the collection; a steel cage crinoline petticoat from the 1850s, which was worn to alleviate the enormous weight women bore due to wearing up to six petticoats at a time.

"Some of those hooped petticoats became extremely wide, up to a metre on each side of the woman's body," Mr Merandy said.

"The whole idea was for you to show off your beautiful silk brocades and obviously the more you could show the wealthier you obviously were."

Another major drawcard for visitors is the chance to catch a glimpse of a set of rarely-seen royal knickers.

It is a pair of drawers that was worn by Queen Victoria in the 1860s.

With a gathered waist and pintucked at the knee, Queen Victoria's drawers are monogrammed with the royal cypher 'VR' for Victorian Regina.

"This is probably the most important piece in the whole collection," said Mr Merandy.

"I think the royals might be wearing much briefer items today, and far more comfortable."

Innerwear becomes outwear

In more recent years, designer underwear has been made famous as outerwear, worn by the world's biggest celebrities.

There are examples of work done by Balenciaga, Versace, Vivienne Westwood and of course Jean Paul-Gaultier, who made the very pointy bra famous for one of Madonna's tours.

Each piece for the exhibition has been sourced from the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, and will be on show in Brisbane until February next year.

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