This thesis aims to highlight the smock-dress within the context of Soviet-Estonia during the post-war epoch, ca. 1950s until 1990s. Through Mauss’s socio-anthropological tripoint view, the concepts and identities of the smock-dress are studied from the angles of biology, sociology and psychology. The intention is to show its widespread use amongst Soviet- Estonian women and their remembrance of it, in accordance with the Soviet ideological structures. Using semi-structured interviews, I have assembled oral history from women who attain this historical retrospective, aiming to depict the smock-dress as both a concept and an object, thus functioning as an emblem of Soviet society rather than a historical artefact. Relying on the terms nostalgia, socio-cultural belonging and phenomenology, I seek to capture the smock-dress as both a vestiary phenomenon and representation of social structures. Thus, creating a dual identity, individual and collective, through its usage, showing that sartorial fashion encompasses more than just emotions and promoted stylistics.

This thesis aims to highlight the smock-dress within the context of Soviet-Estonia during the post-war epoch, ca. 1950s until 1990s. Through Mauss’s socio-anthropological tripoint view, the concepts and identities of the smock-dress are studied from the angles of biology, sociology and psychology. The intention is to show its widespread use amongst Soviet- Estonian women and their remembrance of it, in accordance with the Soviet ideological structures. Using semi-structured interviews, I have assembled oral history from women who attain this historical retrospective, aiming to depict the smock-dress as both a concept and an object, thus functioning as an emblem of Soviet society rather than a historical artefact. Relying on the terms nostalgia, socio-cultural belonging and phenomenology, I seek to capture the smock-dress as both a vestiary phenomenon and representation of social structures. Thus, creating a dual identity, individual and collective, through its usage, showing that sartorial fashion encompasses more than just emotions and promoted stylistics.

The binary of gender is a socially constructed system dividing two opposite sexes, as a result fashion design has required two main fields, womenswear and menswear, and in between them: unisex. In unisex fashion, the male coded garments are favored due to social constructions about gender and norms as well to their loose fitting silhouettes that are used as a solution for being able to fit male and female coded bodies. This work proposes an alternative of what unisex can be through exploring the non-human form of a chair with the purpose to step away from the human body’s biological differences that often dictates fashion design. The method allows for unisex cuts to be explored through the means of experimental pattern cutting, as the gendered body does not dictate the shape of the garment. As a result this work proposes a reaction to the male coded unisex, including female coded materials, decorative shapes allowed to fit many through elasticity. / De binära könsrollerna är ett socialt konstruerat system som delar upp två motsatta kön, vilket resulterat i att modedesign krävt två huvudområden, damkläder och herrkläder, och betraktat som däremellan: unisex. Inom unisex modet gynnas de manligt kodade plaggen på grund av sociala konstruktioner om kön och normer, samt deras löst sittande silhuetter som används som en lösning för att kunna passa både manligt och kvinnligt kodade kroppar. Detta arbete föreslår ett alternativ till vad unisex kan vara genom att utforska den icke-mänskliga formen av en stol med syftet att ta ett steg bort från människokroppens biologiska skillnader som ofta dikterar modedesign. Resultatet föreslår en reaktion på det manligt kodade unisex modet genom att inkludera kvinnligt kodade material, dekorativa former som passar olika kroppar genom sin elasticitet.