See below for recommended dress code guidelines. Neither should be tight. Fabrics should be crisp; colors should generally be solid; navy, black, gray, brown and khaki are always safe bets.

For the most business-like appearance, pants should be creased and tailored; neither extreme of tight or flowing. If you are pursuing a conservative industry and are in doubt, observe well-dressed women in your industry on the job, at career fairs, at information sessions, or consult your career coach. Skirt length and slits: Your skirt should come at least to your knees while you are standing. While you are seated, your thighs should be covered.

If your skirt comes to just below the knee, a slit to just above the knee might be acceptable. A very long skirt should not be slit to above the knee. Generally slits in the center back of a skirt — to facilitate walking a stair climbing — are acceptable. Slits to facilitate a view of your legs are not appropriate for business purposes. Slips should not be visible. Cotton, silk, and blends are appropriate. Velvets and shimmery fabrics suitable for parties are not appropriate.

Fit should not be tight. Cleavage is not appropriate to business and job search occasions. Their principal joins us as we chat. Do many? It takes time to change social norms embedded over many decades. So is it unequal treatment to require girls to wear skirts while boys can wear trousers to school? And could not allowing boys to wear skirts also emerge as an issue? The Equal Status Act prohibits discrimination by schools on gender and other protected grounds, and a pupil, suing through a parent, can bring a claim to the Workplace Relations Commission.

While it is not legal to discriminate between genders where it adversely affects one of them, it is up to someone to bring a legal challenge to test it. Please update your payment details to keep enjoying your Irish Times subscription. What do girls think of obligatory skirts? Commenting on The Irish Times has changed. To comment you must now be an Irish Times subscriber. The account details entered are not currently associated with an Irish Times subscription.

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Gored skirts can be made in any length and usually, they are made from a singular shade of the same fabric throughout. The gypsy skirt is a fun, colorful type of skirt that is easy to make as a DIY project.

The homemade look is what gives this skirt a lot of its charm. The most distinct feature of the gypsy skirt is the tiered design. This is what creates the flared design. The different tiers of the skirt can be made with the same fabric or with different colors of fabric to create all sorts of different looks.

Gypsy skirts may have a range of colors, from black to pink. This is a layered skirt that is made with multiple pieces of square fabric that are stitched together with the points facing downward to give the skirt a zigzagging hem. Usually, this skirt is at least knee-length and may be longer. Handkerchief skirts can be paired with lots of different tops. Unlike the haircut, this skirt is actually in style. According to Vogue , this look appeared as early as the s…and may not have been well-received at the time.

According to her anecdote, the skirt was strange-looking and the subject of a joke. But this style is no joking matter now. Many celebs have been spotted wearing this skirt style, which was perhaps a little ahead of its time back in The high waist skirt , which may be called an empire waist , sits higher than the natural waist, rising up to just under the bustline. The empire waist was very popular in the early s and was seen again a century later. It made another appearance in the s.

When styled well, high waist skirt designs look pretty amazing. Try pairing one with a brief crop top, tube top or halter.

Several skirts in fashion history have been not just extremely impractical but also super difficult to wear.

The hobble skirt may be the most difficult skirt to wear on the list. This skirt became popular for a very brief moment in time at the beginning of the s. Because of the way it was designed, the hobble skirt was extremely hard to walk in…which is definitely not something you want in a skirt.

The hobble skirt is a full-length skirt that is full around the hips and thighs. But then, inexplicably, the bottom of the skirt is quite tight around the ankles. These skirts were so tight, in fact, that women could only walk in them by taking very tiny, shuffling steps. And yes, for some reason, women actually wore this. It was popular. Sometimes, fashion is a little strange.

To make matters worse, women wore a hobble garter to go with the skirt. This was a fabric band that wrapped around each leg, right below the knee, to hold the legs together. This prevented women from taking too-large steps that may rip their hobble skirts. Coming out of the s and the restrictive fashions that had come before, women turned toward much shorter skirts in the s and fashion changed significantly.

Middle Eastern and Asian culture became very fashionable in the early s. People in the Western world were suddenly fascinated by these places, which seemed quite exotic and mysterious in those days. The French fashion designer Paul Poiret drew inspiration from this region, and public taste at the time, using Eastern cultures to influence his fashions.

The hobble skirt was his take on the billowy harem pant style that was popular in the east. Inverted pleat skirts , also called inverted pleated skirts , are just like any pleated skirt but with one major difference.

With ordinary pleats, the pleats are folded so that the folded edges are facing outward. With inverted pleats, the folds of the pleats face inward.

This creates a look that is different from standard pleats. Any type of pleat, including box pleats, can be inverted. Layered skirts are any type of skirt that has multiple sections throughout the entire skirt.

This type of skirt usually has layers made out of the same materials, patterns and colors. They can come in either long or short styles. Layered skirts are simple with their design and were created for comfort. Sometimes these skirts can be found with their layers made out of a different pattern, materials or colors.

The lehenga skirt is a traditional skirt that is worn in India. This is a long skirt that is highly decorated. Lehenga skirts are made in four basic styles: a straight skirt that goes down from the hips with no flare or tapering; a flared skirt; a pleated skirt; a mermaid-style skirt that flares below the knees.

The lehenga is often paired with the choli, the traditional bodice that usually goes with this skirt. The maxi skirt , or maxiskirt , is any long skirt that goes past the middle of the calf but ends above the ankle. Maxi skirts are usually full skirts that may or may not have pleats, ruffles and asymmetrical hems. Some maxi skirts may have slits, tiers or other embellishments.

Maxi dress styles have been very trendy in recent years. The first mermaid gown was created by designed Marcel Rochas in the s. This is a distinct silhouette that gets noticed right away.

The mermaid skirt is a full-length skirt that is close-fitting through the hips and thighs, then flares out past the knee. This skirt style is still seen frequently in fashion, appearing in formal wear and more casual skirts, too. Mermaid skirt styles are also called trumpet skirt styles. The midi skirt is a bit of a fashion anomaly.

It disappeared pretty soon after that, vanishing from stores in the early s as women moved on to new styles. In modern style, midi skirt length varies. But traditionally, this skirt falls to the mid-calf, about four inches below the knee. It flares outward from the waist, creating a full skirt. How many super short skirts have you worn? But when these skirts first appeared on the fashion scene, they were totally shocking.

Mary Quant is famously the woman who created the miniskirt, which became THE look of the s. According to Quant herself, the miniskirt must fall to about the mid-though and be no longer than this. It was scandalously short. It was destined to change fashion for ever. And…it was a design that was thousands of years old. Actually, ancient Europeans living between to B. Frescoes from ancient Egypt show female acrobats wearing miniskirts as well.

Since skirts were one of the first fashion items ever invented in human history, it makes sense that hemlines became short sometime before But Mary Quant at least came up with the modern version of this skirt type, right?

Well…that all depends on how you look at it. Glamorous entertainer Josephine Baker was known to wear a miniskirt in the s. In the s, very short skirts did appear in film in science fiction movies of the day. The movies envisioned a future where women wore their skirts short…very short.

Thanks to Mary Quant, that future came true in The micromini is an even more brief version of the miniskirt. A panel skirt , or paneled skirt , is made up of panels that can be widened or narrowed towards the bottom for an almost straight or twirly full skirt type.

This is ideal for women who want to achieve the look of a slim waist. A panel skirt is made with several panels of fabric that are sewn together to fashion any type of skirt. Just about any skirt can be a panel skirt. The peasant skirt is a long, full skirt with a lot of fabric. This skirt is at least ankle-length and may be floor-length. These are loose, flowing, casual skirts that can be embellished with tiers, ruffles or pleats. The peg-top look had caught on in menswear in the early s.

This style added extra fabric to the hips of the pants, often in the form of pleats, to create a more distinctive silhouette. From the enlarged hips, the trousers narrowed down to the ankle. They were kind of the original Hammer pants, but not nearly as baggy. Pegged pants came first but soon, skirts were made with the pegged hipline. The look quickly caught on and became the hot look in the s. The pencil skirt is also called the fitted skirt , the straight skirt and the tube skirt because of its shape.

Women everywhere wore the tight-fitting skirt, which skimmed the legs from hip to hem. The pencil skirt falls to many different lengths, from knee-length to mid-calf. The pencil skirt came to fame in the s but it has never totally left the style scene since.

Now, pencil skirts are still worn by royals like Meghan Markle and elegant women like Michelle Obama.

The peplum is definitely an interesting type of skirt. It is tapered and close-fitting around the waist and thighs, usually falling to about knee-length.

The peplum was immortalized on the silver screen during the s, when this look was worn by all the most fashionable dames. It was a perfect skirt to wear with a tailored jacket for a business look and became a beautiful look for evening wear at a fancy party or restaurant. But the peplum, like so many things, dates all the way to ancient Greece. Around B. This is where the word peplum comes from. This outfit was a long tube of fabric that was draped and tied at the waist to create an extra fold of fabric for the top half of the body.

This was then cinched a second time to add an extra flap around the waist, creating the peplum shape. Greek women often wore this look. Both men and women wore this skirt style, which re-appeared in fashion again years later in the Victorian Era. The peplum is still seen today. Pleated skirts are made with pleats. Any skirt can be a pleated skirt if it has pleats in it and may have only a few pleats, rather than being pleated all the way around.

The pleats add extra volume and flare to skirts of any length. Pleats are made with the fabric is sharply folded. The pleats can be small or large, spaced widely apart or very close together. One variation of the pleated skirt is the accordion skirt , which is heavily-pleated with many small pleats. The accordion skirt is usually a long skirt that has tightly pressed pleats into the skirt and they are layered on top of each other for an accordion-style effect.

The bottom portion of the skirt is usually circular, which helps to aid in the mobility of the skirt. The accordion skirt can come in various colors and lengths. Knife pleated skirts are the most common types of skirts worn with pleats.

What makes this skirt stand out from all the other starts with pleats is that knife-pleated pleats are defined with sharp folds that go in and out and they overlap each other. Because of this, knife-pleated skirts can be worn in formal and casual settings, depending on the length and the type of material the skirt may be made from. The poodle skirt is really a variation of the circle skirt, but this style is so iconic it definitely deserves its own place on any list. The poodle skirt was the ubiquitous look of the s thanks to Juli Lynn Charlot.

She was an actress and designer who did not know how to sew. In , she added some adorable poodle appliques to a felt circle skirt…and made fashion history. Circle skirts are easy to make, felt is pretty inexpensive and anyone can attach appliques to the fabric.

This is how the poodle skirt trend was born and how it exploded. Soon, the poodle skirt was everywhere.

And who knows? It may catch on again. Praire skirts are long skirts that are flared. Some prairie skirts are only slightly flared, while others are very full. The prairie skirt has one or more deep ruffles or tiers. Back then, the skirts were made with cotton feed sacks or homespun cotton. Modern prairie skirts are not made with cotton feed sacks. However, they are often made with cotton and cotton blends, along with other soft fabrics. Prairie skirts have a beautiful natural drape and a flowy look to them that makes them a popular style for casual wear.

The modern boho skirt is a variation of the prairie skirt. Boho skirts are long and full, like prairie skirts. These skirts can help create many everyday outfit looks. The rah-rah skirt , or ra-ra skirt , is inspired by the classic cheerleader skirt. The rah-rah skirt has two or more overlapping tiers of material or flounces. This is a great skirt to pair with an oversized sweater when you want a cute fall look. A ruffle skirt , or ruffled skirt , can be many different types of skirts.

Any skirt that has a ruffle is a ruffle skirt. The sarong skirt is a traditional Asian garment that is wrapped around the body. Sarongs are typically made from lightweight fabrics. The sarong skirt is wrapped around the body in a slim tube, according to Fashion History. Sarongs are most known as a bathing suit essential. They can come in multiple colors, sizes, patterns and designs. You probably know scooter skirts better as skorts. True scooter skirts are shorts that have a skirt layer covering them.

The shorts are typically just a little bit shorter than the skirt, which is pretty short at least several inches above the knee. When they were first invented, skort styles were called trouser skirts. Skorts are not the same as divided skirt styles, which are pants that are made to look like a flared skirt.

Slip skirt styles are usually thin, lightweight skirts made with silky and satiny fabrics. These skirts look like slips and may be made in any skirt style, from mini skirts to maxi skirts. Slip skirt looks can be elegant and sexy.