Micheline Bernardini wearing the first bikini in 1946
The brain child of a French engineer called Louis Réard, the risqué two-piece quite literally exploded onto the fashion scene.
An entrepreneurial Réard realised that the introduction of fabric rationing by the US government during the war presented him with a money-making opportunity.
Fashion houses had begun to use rationing as an excuse to redesign the swimsuit, using less fabric and revealing more flesh.
Louis Reard, designer of the first bikini, in 1946
The only problem that Réard faced was finding a model brave enough to wear his invention.
Thankfully, a nude dancer by the name of Micheline Bernardini was up for the challenge.
On July 11 1946, Micheline became the first women to wear a bikini, during a press show in Paris.
In 1951 the controversial item was banned following the first Miss World Contest in London.
Declared Sinful by the Vatican, it was soon banned in Belgium, Italy, Spain and Austria.
The arrival of 60s French sex symbol Brigitte Bardot changed all that. Pictures of Brigitte on the beach at the Cannes film festival in 1953, have been attributed to the bikini's change of fortune.
Sales soared and the bikini went into the mainstream. Brigitte’s floral two-piece has been credited with doing more for French international trade than the car industry.
Louis Réard, the designer of the bikini, named the swimsuit after Bikini Atoll, where testing on the atomic bomb was taking place.
The brain child of a French engineer called Louis Réard, the risqué two-piece quite literally exploded onto the fashion scene.
An entrepreneurial Réard realised that the introduction of fabric rationing by the US government during the war presented him with a money-making opportunity.
Fashion houses had begun to use rationing as an excuse to redesign the swimsuit, using less fabric and revealing more flesh.
Louis Reard, designer of the first bikini, in 1946
The only problem that Réard faced was finding a model brave enough to wear his invention.
Thankfully, a nude dancer by the name of Micheline Bernardini was up for the challenge.
On July 11 1946, Micheline became the first women to wear a bikini, during a press show in Paris.
In 1951 the controversial item was banned following the first Miss World Contest in London.
Declared Sinful by the Vatican, it was soon banned in Belgium, Italy, Spain and Austria.
The arrival of 60s French sex symbol Brigitte Bardot changed all that. Pictures of Brigitte on the beach at the Cannes film festival in 1953, have been attributed to the bikini's change of fortune.
Sales soared and the bikini went into the mainstream. Brigitte’s floral two-piece has been credited with doing more for French international trade than the car industry.
Louis Réard, the designer of the bikini, named the swimsuit after Bikini Atoll, where testing on the atomic bomb was taking place.
Dude in Front of That Perv in The Suit is Kirk Douglas, YUGE Star at the time and a bit of "scandal" him chaperoning the Unknown 18 Year Old Breezheet....there in Cannes.
Due to their age difference, he was 36 or 37 and Brigitte may have been 18....prolly was.
But Yeah, hilarious if that was just some Random.
Suit Guy who was wandering down the beach then just positioned himself there. Like That.
Looks like he's oggling Kirk Douglas' ass and not Brigitte tho. Dude might've been a bit of a Poofer
A man hasn't lived life until he finds and marries his best friend, has children together with that person and shares every single thing in life with that person. A man that finds this person and is happy, is completely content with one woman until life is no longer.
I have no interest in anyone else and am the luckiest man on earth and it has nothing to do with money.
