ABSTRACT
T wo years after Helen Gurley Brown bared her soul in Sex and the Single Girl, a forty-two-year-old fashion designer, Rudi Gernreich, decided it was time for women to bare even more. In June 1964, Gernreich introduced the “monokini,” the perfect synthesis of Southern California hedonism, socio-sexual politics, and ready-to-wear wit. Quickly renamed the “topless swimsuit,” Gernreich’s creation was a standard one-piece suit on the bottom with two delicate straps rising archly between the wearer’s breasts. His favorite model, Peggy Moffit, explained to one reporter: “He was trying to take away the prurience, the whole perverse side of sex.” 1 It was his personal contribution to the cause of physical freedom.
