In this photo gallery, we take a look back at a century of style at UBC. From the mandatory jackets and ties, dresses and black academic gowns of the early 1900s, the military uniforms during the war years, to the more fashion-forward “Oxford bags” worn by men, and the knee-high skirt hemlines for women in the late 1920s, fashion on campus is forever evolving.

Yoga wear and rain boots may be ubiquitous around campus nowadays, but fashion standards weren’t always so lax at UBC.
Yoga wear and rain boots may be ubiquitous around campus nowadays, but fashion standards weren’t always so lax at UBC.

Beauty contests and formal balls originated with Red Cross fundraisers during World War II, while standards relaxed during the tenure of President Norman MacKenzie who, “had a penchant for roaming the campus dressed in shabby clothes,” and “wore a freshman beanie during his first year.” Under his influence, male faculty members and students “often wore t-shirts instead of jackets and ties, while some began sporting scraggly beards.”

In keeping with the zeitgeist of the times, students in the sixties and seventies increasingly rejected their parents’ traditional values: men’s hair grew longer and women’s skirts shorter. Students often wore jeans, while women were “no longer in thrall to the criteria set by beauty pageants.” Things spiraled from then on, with acid-wash and perms in the 1980s to the grunge-inspired 1990s right through to the present day.

Check out all the photos here:http://100.ubc.ca/galleries/100-years-of-fashion-at-ubc/

Photos courtesy: UBC Archives Photograph Collection, AMS Archives and the Artona Group Inc.

Information courtesy of “UBC: The First 100 Years” by Eric Damer and Herbert Rosengarten

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