Women's pockets are so useless they rarely even fit women's hands in it. Photo / 123RF
Science has finally proven, beyond any reasonable doubt, something every single woman has always known to be true: pockets in women's clothing are absolute rubbish.
Much has been said but very little has been done about the fact that women can't even carry the average smartphone in their pocket.
A recently released study shows women's pockets are, overall, 48 per cent shorter and 6.5 per cent narrower than men's.
Journalists Jan Diehm and Amber Thomas published their study after analysing measurements of pockets in 80s pairs of jeans (40 men's and 40 women's).
All of men's pockets analysed could fit an iPhone, whereas only 40 per cent of women's pockets could.
Only a mere 10 per cent of women's pockets could fit an average-sized women's hand. By contrast, 100 per cent of men's pockets could fit an average male hand.
The findings are outrageous but not really a surprise to women who live daily with the lack of appropriately functional clothing.
Now that a study has proven that it's an actual issue, the next step is for change to happen - but change won't happen unless people start caring about it.
They should. Here's why: pockets are not just a matter of convenience. Women's pockets are everyone's problem - men included.
You can read as many essays as you want about the complicated history of women's pockets but it can all be summed up in one word: patriarchy.
It seems the smartphone has been the catalyst of an even bigger need for change, and social media could be the amplifier of those voices calling for change. More and more women are speaking up about the urgent need for clothing that actually works, and some fashion brands are starting to listen.
Bottoms without pockets are the most useless pieces of clothing. Pockets are the meaning of life!
— ใใณใท๏ผ๐ณ๏ธโ๐๐๏ฝ๏ฝ ๏ฝ ๏ฝ ๏ฝ๏ฝ ๏ฝ๏ฝ ๏ฝ๏ฝ ๏ฝ๏ฝ~ ๐๐ณ๏ธโโง๏ธ (@eW01F) September 21, 2015
Pockets have been a big issue, in politics and in fashion, since way, way back. Frankly, it's it's about time we all start giving a damn.
To borrow a Facebook troll's favourite saying: "This isn't even news". Women have been rallying for bigger, actually useful pockets since the late 1800s.
Only someone who hasn't spent their life struggling with small pockets (so, a dude) would say a small pocket is no big deal.
Why don't girl sweatpants have pockets?? If I cared about how my ass looked to others I wouldn't be wearing sweatpants!!! #demandpockets
— feeny (@slaptastrophe) December 9, 2014
In 1905, Charlotte P. Gilman wrote in the New York Times: "One supremacy there is in men's clothing ... its adaptation to pockets". "Women have from time to time carried bags, sometimes sewn in, sometimes tied on, sometimes brandished in the hand, but a bag is not a pocket," she added.
She was right. A bag is not a pocket. A bag is on display, a pocket is private.
When it comes to fashion, pockets are very much like high heels and bras: a shameless sexist sign of the gender divide. We can't have an equal society if we keep forcing women to carry bags around because their pockets are too small to be useful.
that feeling of realizing your dress has pockets โ๏ธ๐ผ๐ผโ๏ธ
— ๐๐ธ๐ท๐ฎ๐ โก (@softhoneypot) September 21, 2015
Pockets are, historically, a symbol of self-sufficiency. A good pocket says "I can carry my own stuff".
Back in 1954, Christian Dior described it perfectly: "Men have pockets to keep things in, women for decoration."
skirts with pockets > world peace pic.twitter.com/hsDjMD6LxN
— retired (@motherjohnmisty) September 19, 2015
Before the 1800s, women's clothing did have pockets. They weren't your modern pocket but wearable pouches that detached from the garments. Still, they were discreet places that women could use to carry things in.
Then came the 1800s and women's clothing became sleeker (way too sleek). Women needed to look slim and, as such, the pockets had to go.
It's much more than about looks, though. It's about socio-political notions of property and privacy. Take away a woman's pocket and you take away one of women's rare private spaces, as well as her ability to carry whatever she likes in public without having to obviously disclose it.
The Victoria and Albert Museum, in its history of pockets, describes how dress patterns would include instructions for sewing pockets into the garments. Pockets, an item of undeniable practicality, were an optional afterthought.
Strangely, utilitarian clothing for women is a bittersweet upside of the world wars. With men dying, women began taking over jobs once held only by males. They started wearing trousers and all kinds of other practical clothing โฆ Pockets were finally in!
Well, kind of.
Fashion, and its obsession with making women look as thin as humanly possible, kept taking pockets away. We still had trousers for women but the pockets began to disappear. Most trousers had no pockets, others had the same useless tiny pockets women have today.
Thank the good gods above for people like Coco Chanel, the first designer to sew pockets in women's jackets, back in the 1920s. Sadly, that wasn't enough to start the pocket revolution the world needs to go through.
Things started getting exciting again with the whole "boyfriend" clothing trend, which saw women wearing attire usually designed for men. But, because this has always been a bumpy ride full of roadblocks, then came the rise of the designer handbag.
Of course handbags have been around long before but the designer handbag became an aspirational item. When, really, if we're gonna be 100 per cent honest about this whole thing, handbags are a right pain in the ass. They're something to lug around all day, they're cumbersome and sometimes heavy and, frankly, if we had proper pockets we wouldn't have to carry those things around.
Then came the 90s and the low-waist jeans that left no room for storing things in pockets.
And in case you're wondering, throughout this whole timeline, men are wandering around happily shoving things in their pockets. Yes, pockets, plural. Pockets on their jackets, inside their jackets, on their shirts, on their trousers. Pockets for their pocket watches, pocket knives, pocket anything โฆ The "pocket" prefix is the male's domain.
To this day, proper pockets are an absolute rarity in women's clothing. Most of the time, women's clothing includes no pocket, tiny pockets or the absolute aberration that is the fake pocket, which frankly deserves to die a painful death.
Phones keep getting bigger, women's pockets remain the same: sometimes tiny, often non-existent.
While men's clothing is often thought as functional, women's clothing is all about what it looks like.
So, really, the call for bigger pockets is a call for equality.
You might be a guy who's never struggled with a pocket that can't even fit your own hand (in which case, I'm impressed you even read this far), but you still have a mother or a sister or a good female friend or a neighbour or the goddaughter of a third cousin who sees a skirt with pockets and gets giddy at the thought of not having to carry a handbag just because of their phone and wallet.
I don't care if my phone makes my hips look fat. It's time to riot.
Telegraph: "We were the family that others admired ... the truth was more complicated."