Hotpants

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Short, tight shorts

title: "Hotpants" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["1970-neologisms", "1970s-fads-and-trends", "1970s-fashion", "1980s-fashion", "1990s-fashion", "2000s-fashion", "2010s-fashion", "clubwear", "dancewear", "trousers-and-shorts"] description: "Short, tight shorts" topic_path: "arts" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hotpants" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0

::summary Short, tight shorts ::

::callout[type=note] the item of clothing ::

::figure[src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/8b/Hot_pants.tif" caption="Sketch of hotpants"] ::

::figure[src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/71/Bebe_Hot_Pants_01_2008_(cropped).jpg" caption="Bebe]], 2008"] ::

::figure[src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d2/Man_wearing_pink_hot-pants_at_Nottingham_Pride_MMB_59_(cropped).jpg" caption="Man wearing pink hotpants for a [[gay pride]] event, 2010"] ::

Hotpants or hot pants are extremely short shorts. The term was first used by Women's Wear Daily in 1970 to describe shorts made in luxury fabrics such as velvet and satin for fashionable wear, rather than their more practical equivalents that had been worn for sports or leisure since the 1930s. Hotpants are worn above the knees around the thigh area. The term has since become a generic term for any pair of extremely short shorts. While hotpants were briefly a very popular element of mainstream fashion in the early 1970s, by the mid-1970s they had become associated with the sex industry, which contributed to their fall from fashion. However, hotpants continued to be popular as clubwear well into the 2010s and 2020s and are often worn within the entertainment industry, particularly as part of cheerleader costumes or for dancers (especially backup dancers). Performers such as Britney Spears and Kylie Minogue have famously worn hotpants as part of their public performances and presentation.

Origins and terminology

While the term "hotpants" is used generically to describe extremely short shorts, similar garments had been worn since the 1930s. Hotpants were innovative in that they were made from non-activewear fabrics such as velvet, silk, crochet, fur and leather, and styled explicitly to be worn on the street, for parties, or even as bridal wear, as opposed to previous short shorts that were designed mostly for sportswear and leisure. Dorothy Tricario, a fashion curator at the Brooklyn Museum told The New York Times in 1971 that hotpants were part of a greater nostalgic revival of 1930s and 1940s fashion, specifically the short posing shorts worn by Hollywood stars like Ruby Keeler, Deanna Durbin, and Betty Grable. However, Tricario also observed that shorts had never before had such widespread acceptance as street or business wear as they did in early 1971.

According to the fashion publicist Eleanor Lambert, the term "hot pants" was coined by Women's Wear Daily (WWD) in 1970 to describe fashions innovated by the French ready-to-wear company Dorothée Bis. The WWD claim to have originated the term is also backed up by 1971 articles in The New York Times and the African-American magazine Jet. Other alternative names included "les shorts", "short cuts", "cool pants", and "shortootsies", with "booty shorts" as an early 21st-century term.

::figure[src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/0d/Jacklyn_Ocean_in_her_Daisy_Dukes.jpg" caption="Jacklyn Ocean wearing a type of hotpants known as [[Daisy Dukes]]."] ::

An extremely short version of denim cut-offs are hotpants popularly known as "Daisy Dukes" in reference to Catherine Bach's character of that name from the American television show The Dukes of Hazzard.

Today, the term hotpants can be used for casual as well as fashion-wear short-shorts made in any fabric.

While hotpants were principally marketed to women, men were also targeted, and the term can describe very short men's shorts.

Reception

At the end of the 1960s, the fashion industry had tried unsuccessfully to promote the mid-calf-length or midi skirt as a fashionable replacement for the miniskirt. although these were intended as modesty knickers to wear with matching minidresses rather than standalone fashion garments. Many designers from across the Western world produced their own versions of hotpants at all price levels, including Yves Saint Laurent, Valentino, Halston, and Betsey Johnson. Mass-produced versions were also sold through the Sears mail-order catalogue.

Hotpants were available for women, men and children, although they were principally worn by women. Hotpants for men were slightly longer than the women's versions, although they were still shorter than usual.

The James Brown song "Hot Pants (She Got to Use What She Got to Get What She Wants)", released in August 1971, was, according to his trombonist Fred Wesley, inspired by the sight of women of all colours wearing hotpants in a wide range of materials in the Black and White Club, Brussels.

The historian Valerie Steele noted that hotpants, both as a name, and as a garment, quickly became associated with sexuality and prostitution due to their popularity with male spectators.

In 2000, Kylie Minogue notably wore a pair of gold lamé hotpants in her music video for "Spinning Around", which led to widespread media focus on the garment and the singer's body within. The hotpants were eventually donated by Minogue to the Performing Arts Collection museum at the Arts Centre, Melbourne, where they are described as "one of the most identifiable items of contemporary popular culture." Also that same year, Aida Pierce wore a pair of black hotpants for her first Humor es...Los comediantes sketch, "El ganadero", which also featured fellow comics Carlos Espejel and Teo Gonzalez.

Hotpants, also called booty shorts, continue being popular well into the 2010s, and are often seen in particular contexts such as Miami's South Beach and Venice Beach, Los Angeles, whose beach-to-bar environments have unique dress codes.

In uniforms

Hotpants can also be part of a uniform worn by cheerleaders (as made popular by the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders) and performers, or required wear in certain service industries (such as the Hooters restaurant chain).

Southwest Airlines became notorious for the hotpants uniform they supplied for their stewardesses (nicknamed "Love Birds") in 1971, as featured in an ad campaign with the slogan "Someone Else Up There Who Loves You." The tangerine-coloured uniforms (designed by Juanice Gunn Muse, the wife of M. Lamar Muse, the Southwest Airlines president) were worn by girls who were chosen for their good looks and friendliness. Lamar Muse boasted that having beautiful attendants in hotpants ensured that male passengers would fight to sit on the aisle rather than by the window. However, feminist organisations such as Stewardesses for Women's Rights protested and lobbied against the uniform.

Also in 1971, the Hot Pants Patrol was introduced as an elite corps of female ushers for the Philadelphia Phillies baseball team, with the intention of attracting greater audiences for the games. While the majority of "Fillies" wore white microskirts as part of their uniform, the 36 members of the Hot Pants Patrol wore a red hotpants jumpsuit with white vinyl go-go boots. After pressure from feminist organisations, the Phillies retired the Hot Pants Patrol in 1982.

Hotpants or booty shorts remain a popular costume for cheerleaders and dancers, particularly hip hop performers, and are frequently worn by backup dancers. The uniform of the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders consists of hotpants and midriff tops. In the early 21st century hotpants continue to be part of certain service industry uniforms, particularly where the wearers are likely to serve a predominantly male clientele. One example of this is Hooters, where the servers (or "Hooters Girls") wear orange dolphin shorts along with a tight tank top, pantyhose and a bra.

Extremely short shorts have also seen use within military use. Unofficially, members of the Rhodesian and South African armed forces wore extremely short shorts due to fighting in the hot climates there. The Austrian Army also used short shorts for PT wear.

File:Member of the Hot Pants Patrol.jpg|Philadelphia Phillies Hot Pants Patrol uniform, 1975 File:Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders - Series 02 - 009.jpg|A Dallas Cowboys Cheerleader wearing uniform hotpants, 2011 File:Hooters Calendar Girl Melissa Poe.jpg|A Hooters waitress, Melissa Poe, wearing a type of hotpants known as dolphin shorts.

References

References

  1. (1993). "Fifty Years Among the New Words: A Dictionary of Neologisms 1941–1991". [[Cambridge University Press]].
  2. Such was their popularity in the 1950s that [[the Royal Teens]]' hit song "[[Short Shorts]]" paid homage to a similar item."To the Tune of Millions," Newsweek, March 31, 1958
  3. (2015-12-14). "Fashion Fads Through American History: Fitting Clothes into Context". ABC-CLIO.
  4. (2010). "The dictionary of fashion history". Berg.
  5. (2000). "Fifty years of fashion: new look to now". [[Yale University Press]].
  6. Klemesrud, Judy. (January 31, 1971). "New York Times: The Times of the Seventies: The Culture, Politics, and Personalities that Shaped the Decade". Hachette Books.
  7. (1976). "World of Fashion: People, Places, Resources". R. R. Bowker Co..
  8. Smaltz, Audrey. (25 March 1971). "HotPants, or 'Knockout-Shorts', Worn by Sexy, Proud Women!".
  9. (11 October 1981). "Catherine Bach Defends the Dukes". Beaver County Times.
  10. (19 May 2014). "Jennifer Lopez Wears Leather Hotpants Like No Other". Huffington Post India.
  11. (16 June 2009). "Rio Ferdinand Emulates Ronaldo in Hotpants". The Telegraph.
  12. (19 November 2007). "Historical Dictionary of the Fashion Industry". Scarecrow Press.
  13. Werlin, Katy. (2015). "Clothing and Fashion: American Fashion from Head to Toe". ABC-CLIO.
  14. (1 January 1981). "Fabulous Fashion 1907–67: Exhibition from the Costume Institute, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York". International Cultural Corporation of Australia.
  15. (2020). "Fashion in the 1960s". Shire Publications.
  16. (1999). "The 1970s". Lucent Books.
  17. Wesley, Fred. (2002-09-25). "Hit Me, Fred: Recollections of a Sideman". [[Duke University Press]].
  18. Halligan, Benjamin. (26 June 2013). "The Music Documentary: Acid Rock to Electropop". Routledge.
  19. Ricketson, Matthew. (27 July 2002). "Kylie's Seat of Power". [[Fairfax Media]].
  20. (14 February 2014). "Kylie Minogue – Kylie Minogue Donates Famous Hot Pants to Australian Museum". [[Contactmusic.com]].
  21. (2007-06-01). "Working the Skies: The Fast-paced, Disorienting World of the Flight Attendant". NYU Press.
  22. Wald, Matthew L.. (7 February 2007). "M. Lamar Muse, 86, Dies; Led Southwest Airlines". The New York Times.
  23. (2013). "Plane Queer: Labor, Sexuality, and AIDS in the History of Male Flight Attendants". University of California Press.
  24. (2 April 1971). "City of Brotherly Love gets Hot Pants Patrol". The Montreal Gazette.
  25. "The Phillies 'Hot Pants Patrol' Was Indeed a Thing, Once Upon f Time".

::callout[type=info title="Wikipedia Source"] This article was imported from Wikipedia and is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Content has been adapted to SurfDoc format. Original contributors can be found on the article history page. ::

1970-neologisms1970s-fads-and-trends1970s-fashion1980s-fashion1990s-fashion2000s-fashion2010s-fashionclubweardanceweartrousers-and-shorts