I’d guess that the phrase ‘Teddy Boy’ doesn’t mean much to most of my readers. Despite the name, it’s not a furry thing, or a niche kink for gay guys into teddy bears. It was actually one of the very first UK youth subcultures. It started in the 1950’s and leaned heavily on Edwardian fashion cues from the turn of the century. It’s particularly meaningful to me because I’ve seen old photographs of my father and his friends from the late 1950’s dressed in the Teddy Boy style.
What I hadn’t realized was that there were Teddy Girls as well. This twitter thread has some great photographs of them, along with a modern fashion shoot that was inspired by that subculture. The images below are two examples taken from the thread. Obviously, none of this is really related to femdom at all, but I just love the confidence, style and dash of the girls involved.
What’s particularly fascinating is that these images were all shot by Ken Russell, who’d later go on to direct films such as Tommy, Women In Love, The Devils and (particularly relevant to this blog) The Lair of the White Worm. He took a whole series of striking black and white photographs of teenagers in 1950’s London, capturing both the destruction of the war and the postwar exuberance of youth. You can find more of his work and the background to it in articles here, here and here.
