The Modern Girl: Image or Reality? A young woman enjoys a dessert at the Romanesque Café in Berlin in 1924 (left). The independence of this “modern girl,” wearing fashionable clothes with a revealing hemline and lacking an escort, transgressed familiar gender roles and shocked and fascinated contemporaries. Images of the modern girl appeared in movies, illustrated magazines, and advertisements, such as this German poster selling “this winter’s perfume.” Did the emerging consumer society of the 1920s open doors to liberating behavior for women, or did it set new standards that limited women’s options?
poster: Lordprice Collection/Alamy Stock Photo)