Making do : Britons and the refashioning of the postwar world / Susan L. Carruthers.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Carruthers, Susan L. (Susan Lisa), author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Clothing and dress--Social aspects--Great Britain--History--20th century.

Clothing and dress.

Fashion--Great Britain--History--20th century.

Fashion.

Clothing trade--Great Britain--Equipment and supplies--History--20th century.

Clothing trade.

Rationing--Great Britain--History--20th century.

Rationing.

World War, 1939-1945--Great Britain--Influence.

World War, 1939-1945.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (xiii, 384 pages) : digital, PDF file(s).

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

Cambridge, United Kingdom ; New York, NY : Cambridge University Press, 2025.

Summary:

Imagine a world in which clothing wasn't superabundant - cheap, disposable, indestructible - but perishable, threadbare and chronically scarce. Eighty years ago, when World War II ended, a textile famine loomed. What would everyone wear as uniforms were discarded and soldiers returned home, Nazi camps were liberated, and millions of uprooted people struggled to subsist? In this richly textured history, Carruthers unpicks a familiar wartime motto, 'Make Do and Mend', to reveal how central fabric was to postwar Britain. Clothes and footwear supplied a currency with which some were rewarded, while others went without. Making Do moves from Britain's demob centres to liberated Belsen - from razed German cities to refugee camps and troopships - to uncover intimate ties between Britons and others bound together in new patterns of mutual need. Filled with original research and personal stories, Making Do illuminates how lives were refashioned after the most devastating war in human history.

Contents:

Cover

Half-title page

Title page

Copyright page

Dedication

Contents

List of Figures

Note on the Text

List of Abbreviations

Introduction

1 Victors

'Threadbare Millions'

'Victory Clothing'

Dressing Down

Dressing Up

'A Little Colour': The 1946 Victory Parade

2 Survivors

Entering the Camp

Clothing and Contagion

Redress

'Harrods'

'Back to Life'

Make, Do and Mend

3 Veterans

'Heroes in Rags'

'Not the Austerity Pattern'

Selling the Package

'Beware of Sharks'

'Feminine Taste'

Democratizing Device or Divisive Entitlement?

4 Protestors

A Sea of Veteran Protest

Terms of Engagement

Anatomy of a Mutiny

The Sartorial Politics of Colonial Service

From the RAF to the Raffish

Double Crossings

5 Germans

Radical Alterations

'This Misery of Boots': Victor Gollancz and Save Europe Now

Ties and Binds

In the Zone

Judgments at Nuremberg

6 Workers

'We Can't Get On without the Women'

From Displaced Person to European Volunteer Worker

'Clothed in Prospective Britishness'

Hostel Environment

Productive and Reproductive Bodies

Marriage Plots

7 Brides

'Annus horrendus'

The Princess and the Coupons

Something Borrowed

Ambassadresses

Ever After …

Conclusion

Epilogue

Acknowledgements

Notes

Index.

Notes:

Title from publisher's bibliographic system (viewed on 24 Apr 2025).

ISBN:

1-009-46427-2

1-009-46429-9

1-009-46424-8