Recently, a vintage advertisement from a 1969 issue of The New Yorker magazine sparked a vivid memory from my late childhood – a time when my deepest desire was to be enveloped in flowers. The ad showcased a modest cotton shift dress from Villager, a prominent label of the burgeoning preppy style. During the 1960s, Villager, along with its sister brand Ladybug, virtually submerged suburban American girls in a sea of floral prints. While societal shifts were brewing across political, sexual, and musical landscapes, much of suburbia, as eloquently depicted by John Cheever and John Updike, remained in a state of romantic self-satisfaction, reminiscent of upper-class England during the idyllic spring of 1914.
There was an overarching sense of societal arrival, an air of triumphant serenity within a culture whose values and standards – defined by station wagons, manicured green lawns, briefcase-carrying fathers, and pearl-clad mothers – had seemingly become eternally fixed. This self-congratulatory atmosphere was mirrored in the era’s pastoral women’s fashions: demure blouses, cleverly tailored shirtdresses, A-line skirts, blazers, and, reaching the height of popularity, even bras, underpants, sunhats, and tote bags – all adorned with Liberty-style blossoms in the delicate hues of Edwardian botanical illustrations. Along the East Coast, in that pre-global brand American era, before the term “preppy” was etched into the national consciousness by “Love Story,” boarding school students and country club wives alike embraced Ladybug and Villager. Until, inevitably, the changing times swept them away towards the hippie movement.
At eleven years old, I myself harbored a passionate longing for a complete wardrobe of floral cotton garments—a desire laden with ironies. Unknowingly, I was part of a social revolution: a slender girl from Philadelphia, one of the first black students to attend a prestigious girls’ private school in Bryn Mawr, an institution steeped in high society where, historically, black individuals were only seen in domestic roles. I have extensively written about my experiences at that school, where I thoroughly learned what it meant to be an outsider. Yet, there was always an elusive quality to that experience that I struggled to fully grasp. I finally rediscovered it in that faded, decades-old fashion sketch, which powerfully reminded me of what it feels like to be very young and to yearn with all your being to become someone unattainable.
Villager fever gripped me during my initial month at the new school. Strict regulations mandated that our pre-teen bodies be concealed in modest blue uniforms. However, on a civilian day, preceding a long fall weekend, I was met with a floral explosion in the hallways. My classmates were gathered, admiring each other’s outfits in a vibrant kaleidoscope of Villager and Ladybug prints. What was I, already marked as different, wearing that day? Perhaps a simple cotton blouse and a corduroy skirt, typical attire at my previous Quaker school where clothing held little significance. But everything shifted in an instant as I encountered a wall of dazzling new symbols and values, embodied in those tiny blossoms. Before then, my life’s ambition had been, vaguely, a career as a world-renowned archaeologist or a prima ballerina. Suddenly, with a sharp pang that signified the true onset of adolescence, I desired something entirely different: to be accepted by the glamorous school clique that had no place for me. While my skin color and hair texture were immutable, a desperate instinct whispered that the right outfit might magically bridge the gap, bringing me closer to becoming a white girl with a talent for field hockey and a Main Line address. This yearning for acceptance, for a kind of belonging symbolized by clothing, resonates even today when considering the social dynamics often associated with school uniforms, and perhaps even the aspiration to fit into a certain image, like the idealized “Ondrea Lee Schoolgirl Uniform,” though my desire was focused on floral prints rather than the traditional uniform.
My mother deemed Villager and Ladybug overpriced fads and initially refused to buy me even a single blouse. Interestingly, my fantasy was so personal and fragile that I barely contested her decision. Thus began my period of floral ambition, where those quaint, pastoral names—I soon learned that Ladybug was a junior line of Villager—seemed to unlock a gateway to a forbidden paradise, scented with Marie Antoinette-esque rusticity. Their advertisements in newspapers and magazines formed a campaign that, even in advertising’s golden age, was a minor masterpiece. Typically, a precise black-and-white pen-and-ink drawing would depict a vintage wire dress form showcasing an enchantingly simple ensemble. Below, an anonymous Madison Avenue wordsmith would craft a prose poem, evoking the aristocratic yet whimsical style of a heroine who represented a spirited transition between sporty debutante and revolutionary chick. The copy possessed a tongue-in-cheek literary quality, suggesting that the quintessential Villager girl was a Wellesley English major with a hint of Brett Ashley’s rebelliousness.
“Fall of Flowers” was the title of one shirtdress advertisement from the summer 1965 collection:
Raining softly downwards like the quality of mercy. Small flowers with long stems and pointy leaves. Villager’s very soft very light cotton twill crosses them with faint shadows. The dress itself, pleated down the front, gives the impression of gentle motion, like grass in the wind.
This ad copy, along with the visual style, perfectly captured the essence of the brand and the era, a time when even fashion advertising could evoke a sense of romantic idealism and a longing for a specific kind of belonging, much like the aspirational image sometimes associated with the idea of an “ondrea lee schoolgirl uniform” in a different context. While my own yearning was for floral prints, the underlying desire to conform and belong through clothing remains a universal experience, whether it’s through adopting the floral fashions of the 60s or aspiring to a particular school uniform aesthetic.
