Panty Lines

Horst P. Horst/© CondÈ Nast Archive/CORBIS
Busk, Bustle, Combination, Girdle, Waspie, Mamillare, Guepiere: With all this underwear detailing everywhere in London (and the Yanks think we're repressed!), I realized I needed to refresh on a glossary of terms. So early this morning, (well, not that early, I'm sure my co-blogger Paul Smith had swum 40 lengths already. Honestly, it is all so humbling), I searched through my bookshelves and found "A History of Women's Underwear" by Cecil Saint Laurent (no relation to YSL as far as I can gather). Anyway, it's an excellent book, published in 1986 and you might find it awfully useful right now. Not that it will be easy to track a copy-I suspect the interns in every designer studio from New York to Tokyo have beaten you there.