Fashion always provides certain clues about both current culture and the times. For example, in the mid 1800s, dresses made with miles of yardage reflected the relative affluence of the wearer. Remember Scarlett O’Hara? During hard economic times, such as the Great Depression, hemlines tend to go up and dress cuts are more trim and slim, simply because fabric is at a premium price. During such times, less is more in the fashion world. When times improve, hemlines go down and fashions are much less stingy on the yardage. The popularity of the midi fashions of the late 1960s and early 1970s attests to this fashion fact. Fashion designers move with the times, reinventing designs of past decades with a modern twist.