Origin of Everything

[intro music] (host) Why was pink for boys And did you know that young boys used to wear dresses?

Pink for boys and blue for girls used to be the fashion rule, but when did that switch?

And when did young boys stop wearing dresses?

If you want to hear something a little confusing to modern sensibilities, an 1893 article in "The New York Times" gave the rule of thumb to, quote, "Always give pink to a boy and blue to a girl," which, to put it mildly, would make all those gender-reveal parties a little confusing.

But although today, we take it for granted that blue is the color for boys and pink is the color equivalent of all things feminine, when did we first start making that assumption?

And why pink and blue?

Why not green for girls and lilac for boys?

What is it about these two hues that cornered the market on infant fashion?

Well, it seems like the answer to this puzzle lies somewhere in the 19th century style guides, our old friend advertising, and the advent of modern ultrasounds.

But before we get into all of these important questions, we should first ask ourselves: What were babies wearing before pink and blue?

Well, the perhaps unexpected answer to this question is that, before babies were being outfitted in gender-specific pastels, they didn't wear colors at all.

In fact, most babies in the U.S. and Europe were sporting unisex white gowns and dresses or gowns that were simply the color of the fabric that they were made from.

Pastels didn't even play a part.

And in these gowns, it was a convenience more than gender that was dictating the getups since dresses without fitted bottoms made it easier for parents to change a child's soiled diapers and underclothing.

Also, white wasn't just a matter of style but a question of practicality.

White clothing could be cleaned more easily either by using stronger soaps and bleach or outside without having to worry about maintaining and preserving their distinct colors.

So, not only did babies rock a surprisingly colorless wardrobe, they were also pretty much uniformly rocking dresses-- a look that we now associate very strongly with femininity, girls, and women.

But, after checking out this picture of a young Franklin Roosevelt rocking a dress circa 1884, you have to admit that if even future presidents were wearing white dresses, then it wasn't just an anomaly.

In fact, it was the fashion that young boys should wear dresses until they were about six or seven, when they would also receive their first haircuts.

So, through much of the 19th century, babies looked pretty indistinct, at least along gender lines, and it wasn't thought of as an issue at all.

All children wore the same clothes, and that was thought of as the norm.

But that brings us to our next question: When did colors come into play?

Well, the idea that colors could be added to baby clothing in the U.S. wasn't introduced in popular culture until the mid-19th century, according to Professor Jo B. Paoletti at the University of Maryland.

But, even then, colors weren't always so closely aligned to gender.

That didn't come into play until after World War I.

And when they did start getting lined up to certain baby genders, it wasn't always blue equals boy and pink is for girls.

In fact, sometimes, it was the opposite.

Paoletti argues that in order for clothing to assume a certain gender identity or association, the pattern of use has to line up with concepts and cultural norms that we assume are unambiguously connected to a specific gender, and some of these assumptions are based on the pattern of use of a particular garment.

Take, for example, the plain white T-shirt.

In the 1940s, plain white T-shirts were considered a masculine garment because it was primarily circulating on men and being worn by men.

Think back on some of the plain white Ts sported by Marlon Brando and James Dean.

But, as time progressed, fashions changed, and now both men and women wear plain white Ts regularly.

So, someone today wouldn't necessarily assume that this garment signifies a specific gender.

This was the same for infant dresses and colors throughout the 19th century because the plain dresses were thought of as children's clothing more broadly.

There wasn't a concern that they should wear distinct outfits based on whether they were boys or girls.

And even as colors were introduced into the baby fashion lexicon, there wasn't a clearcut formula down gender lines.

For example, a June 1918 article in Earnshaw's Infants' Department publication stated: "The generally accepted rule is pink for the boys "and blue for the girls.

"The reason is that pink, "being the more decided and strong color, "is more suitable for the boy, "while blue, which is more delicate and dainty, is prettier for the girl."

Sounds strange now, doesn't it?

Additionally, according to the "Smithsonian Magazine," some sources note that blue should be for blond and blue-eyed children while pink was ideal for brown-eyed babies and brunettes.

In 1927, "Time" Magazine had a style chart that suggested gender-appropriate colors for children, and department stores across the country suggested boys wear pink, including Filene's, Best & Co, Halle's, and Marshall Field.

So, choosing colors based on gender was a fairly recent phenomenon, but if baby colors weren't always pink and blue, that leads us to our next question: When did pink become a color for girls, and when did blue get assigned to boys?

Well, it seems that assigning pink and blue had a lot to do with manufacturers around the time current Baby Boomers were children, because even though we've listed that some style guides suggested pink for boys, others argued for boys wearing blue and girls in pink.

In the 1940s, manufacturers began making clothing that color-coordinated for young boys and young girls, dividing the population between blue and pink color assignments based on what they believed the public would like and what they would buy.

And eventually, the gender color codes we know today won out.

But, as Paoletti argues, "it could have gone the other way."

There's really no dedicated logic behind the assignment of these colors to feminine and masculine qualities in the U.S.

In fact, if you look around the world, colors can come to signify multiple meanings and rituals across cultures.

For example, red in South Africa can stand for mourning, whereas in China, red can be a harbinger of good luck.

In Germany and France, yellow can be a signifier of jealousy, whereas in Japan, yellow can be used for bravery, wealth, and refinement.

And blue can be seen as a sign of different religious practices and carry special significance in Judaism, Catholicism in Latin America, and Hinduism.

So, colors are up for grabs as cultural markers, and the designation of pink and blue to certain genders was as much about the marketing choices at the beginning of the 20th century as it was about preferences believed to be tied to masculine and feminine traits.

In fact, even though pink and blue color codes, boys wearing pants to emulate their fathers, and infant girls wearing dresses to mirror mom saw a rise in popularity at the beginning of the 20th century, it somewhat waned in the 1960s.

With the rise of the Women's Liberation Movement, there was some easing in the manufacturers' push of color-coded and gender-specific clothing, with unisex clothes seeing some popularity again.

So, even though there still remained pink clothes for girls, there was a wider range of outfits designed to give young girls more freedom of movement and activity than the more standard dresses.

But by the 1980s, we see the cementing of color-coded clothing for infants with specific gendering.

And that may be related to improvements in ultrasound technology.

Around 1985, when ultrasounds were getting clearer and clearer, parents were able to ask their healthcare provider the big question at the heart of every gender-reveal video: "Are we having a boy or a girl?"

And that's when products for infants geared towards a specific baby outcome increased in demand and popularity.

Now, affluent parents, and parents in general, could design their nurseries and baby wardrobes around gender and were urged to buy new sets of items for different genders instead of reusing unisex clothing and gear.

This spread to all parts of the baby domain, from clothing to diapers, toys, and furniture.

Also, the idea that a person should be able to distinguish a baby's gender as soon as you see them stood at the heart of many pushes to dress children in noticeably different clothing that would distinguish them one from another, whereas, prior to the 20th century, this wasn't considered a pressing concern of most parents looking for baby attire.

So, how does it all add up?

Well, it seems like through most of the 19th century, U.S. babies all wore dresses, and those dresses were almost always white.

And parents, while still concerned with the identity of their babies, weren't as anxious to distinguish them from each other in infancy through their attire.

In fact, children's clothes were designed with ease in mind more so than displaying masculine or feminine traits.

But, as we got into the 20th century, style guides and companies started pushing particular colors for particular genders, in part because they were able to capitalize on parents' need to buy new clothing according to the gender of their child instead of reusing or handing down unisex clothes.

And although gendered colors were waning by the '60s and '70s, improvements in ultrasounds allowed parents to make predictions and nursery-design plans around the gender of upcoming babies.

So, even though pink and blue could easily be reversed, it might not have changed how we conceive of gender in the popular domain, but rather how we draw associations and assumptions about gender based on certain color schemes.

So, what you do you think?

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