Wearing Flowers : Art, Fashion and Masculinity in 1920s Italy

This chapter addresses the cultural role of the floral boutonnière in Italian men’s attire of the 1920s. It investigates how flowers were worn and explores the ways in which they negotiated the dichotomies between masculinity and femininity, and between transgression and conventional values of elegance. By analysing the case of Filippo de Pisis (1896–1956), one of Italy’s most emblematic aesthetes, writers, and painters in early 20th-century Italian history, this chapter explores the different meanings that the boutonnière represented in men’s fashion. Flowers serve here as an entry point for adopting a historical approach to fashion in relation to gender, sexuality, politics, and the body. This chapter argues that wearing fresh flowers on men’s outfits constitutes a gender-bending practice.