Overview
Postwar Australia produced a genuinely local way of dressing, and it came from two places rather than one: the working clothes of the bush, which turned into brands, and the beach, which turned into an industry. What holds them together is that both answer to sun and heat rather than to a northern-hemisphere calendar.
Key garments and style
The rural line is now mostly worn in cities. The Akubra, a rabbit-fur felt hat with a broad brim, the Driza-Bone oilskin coat and R.M. Williams elastic-sided boots all began as working equipment and became national signals, worn well away from any paddock.
The beach line is younger and bigger. Board shorts, rash vests and thongs came out of surfing, and the surfwear companies founded around Torquay in Victoria from the late 1960s grew into global brands — one of the few cases of Australian clothing exported as clothing rather than as fibre.
Sun changed dress in a way few countries can match. The Slip, Slop, Slap campaign from 1981, and the skin-cancer rates behind it, put broad-brimmed and legionnaire hats and covering swimwear into schools, so a generation grew up with sun-protective clothing as a rule rather than a preference.
Migration since 1945 and Aboriginal-owned design studios have both fed into what is worn and printed.
Transition
Australian dress sits inside global fashion while keeping its outdoor and beach vocabulary, which is now exported rather than only worn locally.