What some women think to be the perfect summer dress got its start about 60 years ago as a wrap around house dress.  Yes, this is another Swirl post.

About a month ago a VFG friend sent me a link to an unusual Swirl she had found for sale.  Unusual because it was floor length.  The lenght wasn't the only oddity - this dress was clearly before 1966, and it had the regular Swirl label, not the later ones associated with maxi dresses: SwirlGirl, Concepts 70s and 80s, and Swirl with Maxine.  I knew that the changing times were fastly making the "housedress" obsolete, but I did not realize that even before the introduction of the new labels that Swirl was attempting to update their image and to market their products to a younger crowd.

So it was not so much of a surprise whan I spotted this dress in the March, 1964 Seventeen magazine this week:

"For relaxing or entertaining at home, Susan chooses this long, full whirl of dotted swiss cotton.  It has an easy back-wrapped skirt strewn with embroidered flowers, a demure square neckline and a pretty ribbon tie belt in a rose pink.  In sizes 7 - 15J.  By Swirl, about $20."

From this you can see that by 1963 Swirl was planning to move into the juniors market.  It must have been a real coup, getting a Swirl pictured in the youthful Seventeen!    By the next year, teens had their own Swirl label, SwirlGirl.

Last week, I had business in Easley, SC, the town where Swirls were manufactured.  The factory, built in 1953, stood empty for years after the company shut down its operation.  But now the building is being used again, converted into multiple business spaces.