You can hardly tell the difference between shirts for men or women these days. The color, cut and the pattern is the same, but there is a difference if you look closely. The buttons on the men’s shirt are sewn on the right and women’s shirts are sewn on the left. But why are the buttons on the left side of women’s shirts? There were and are good reasons for this pattern. Let’s find out.
At this time, when women wear pants and ties and men wear skirts and high heels, the transitions between women and men fashion seem to be fluid. You would hardly find any differences as there is a huge variety in the unisex section of clothing. But that’s not entirely true because if you look very closely, the men have the button on their shirts facing the right, while the buttons on women shirts are on the left.
Does this only serve to distinguish between male and female? Why are the buttons on the right side of women shirts while men have it on the right? In fact, there are several reasons for this contrast, for which one has to look back a little in the history of clothing.
In this case, it is worth taking a look at the Middle Ages, at the time when men still had to go out fighting to defend their castles. It was actually vital for them that the button placket was on the right side. Because when it came to a fight, the man had to get his sword or rapier quickly. Since then, as now, most people were right-handed, the gun was on the left. When men drew their guns, they were under no circumstances allowed to get caught on their buttons. So it made sense to put the button panel on the right side. So the weapon could slide perfectly over the button panel in an emergency.
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Blouse Buttons Are Sewn On The Left – Why Are The Buttons On The Left Side Of Women’s Shirts
Even with women, the buttons were not randomly placed on the left side. Here, however, the arguments don’t seem quite as solid. The most plausible are two theories. First, only the wealthy woman could afford blouses. And most of the time, the ladies were so wealthy that they didn’t have to close this garment by themselves. They had a maid for this service. As a predominantly right-handed woman, the clerk was able to close the buttons better when they were on the left side from the mistress’ perspective.
However, it is questionable why the upper class should bother to make the work of their employees easier. Perhaps it was more like this, the button panel was more of a status symbol for women. If the buttons were sewn on the left side, the woman could express the world ‘Look here, I can afford a maid to button my blouse’. The second theory is that once the man always walked to the left of the woman. The buttons of her blouse had to be on the left side as well because only he was allowed to see his wife.
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Later, the reasons for the different buttons no longer applied. However, the difference was retained. The reason was simple, women increasingly emancipated themselves and dressed more and more like men. The cuts of shirt and blouse were becoming more and more similar. Nevertheless, it was also considered disreputable to wear men’s clothing as a woman. So a difference was needed. And so it is until today, the button placket on shirt and blouse now sometimes provides the only indication of who the item of clothing is actually intended for. This is why the buttons are on the left side of women’s shirts.