What day is it?

July 5 – it’s time to take sunscreen and hurry to the beach, because on this day the whole world celebrates Bikini day. This summer event is a real find for every woman. You can celebrate by putting everything aside, wearing a sexy bikini and sipping on cool drinks on a hot beach. In 2022, World Bikini Day will be celebrated on Tuesday, July 5.

How did the idea to celebrate World Bikini Day come about?

Worldwide Bikini day is celebrated as the anniversary of the creation of the open swimsuit. This design was proposed by the famous French fashion designer Louis Riard in 1946. In those days, the open swimsuit model was considered too daring and immodest, so it gradually came into widespread use. And the bikini owes its popularity to popular stars, including Brigitte Bardot and Avi Gardner, who began wearing open swimsuits on public beaches and in their films.

Bikini can without a doubt be called one of the greatest inventions of all time, even though its beginnings were not exactly explosive. What can you say about its name, which came from Bikini Atoll, which is in the southern part of the Pacific Ocean. It was there that the hydrogen bomb was tested in 1954.

First bikini

Despite the fact that the history of the modern open swimsuit began quite recently, women wore it long before the model created by Riar. So, the earliest references to bikinis are documented in an ancient Roman mosaic dating back to the 4th century. B.C. and is called “Chamber of Ten Maidens”. It depicts women in bikinis participating in sports and athletic events.

Swimwear in the 1800s

Today you can find bikinis in every size, design and color. Modern designers offer a wide selection of models so that women of different shapes can choose their perfect bikini. However, it was not always like that.

The first samples of beachwear, which has always caused fierce controversy, appeared in the 1800s. According to the dictates of the morality of those times, swimwear consisted of a long baggy dress with a belt. And to protect the skin from radiation, women often wore stockings on the beach and covered themselves with umbrellas from the sun. One can only imagine how unacceptable it would have been in those days to dive and sunbathe in an outfit made of two small pieces of flannel.

The first prototypes of modern bikinis

Acute cotton shortages after World War II led the US Industrial Council to curtail the use of natural fiber cloth. In this regard, the use of fabric for sewing women’s beachwear was also reduced. This is how closed swimsuits with small open fragments appeared.

Designer Jacques Heim, who ran a beach shop in the resort town of Cannes, which now hosts the film festival, created a two-piece swimsuit in 1946 that he called Atome, a la atom. Around that time, Louis Rear introduced the navel-baring swimsuit to the world. Louis Rear is a French designer who runs a lingerie store owned by his mother. And his work was presented to the general public on July 5, 1946, five days after the first hydrogen bomb tests on Bikini Atoll, USA. So he hoped to get an “explosive reaction” to his invention.

While Europe embraced the bikini with enthusiasm after a long and difficult world war, America only embraced the bikini in the 1960s.

Interesting facts about bikinis

• In 1951, when the first Miss World pageant was held, the winner, Swede Kiki Hokansson, received her title in a bikini. Countries with religious and Orthodox conventions were able to withdraw their representatives, which led to bikinis being banned from beauty pageants around the world. Håkansson became the first, last and only Miss World to be crowned in a bikini.
• The cost of the most expensive bikini in the world is 30 million dollars! It was created by Susan Rosen for Steinmetz Diamonds. The bikini was made entirely of diamonds and was featured center stage in the 2006 Sports Illustrated Swimsuit issue. The bikini featured more than 150 carats of flawless diamonds, including a 51-carat pear-shaped stone, a 30-carat emerald cut.
• The first woman to wear a bikini was Frenchwoman Micheline Bernardini, who flaunted it at a press conference held on July 5, 1946 by Louis Rear in a public swimming pool.
• Sharmila Tagore wore a bikini in An Evening in Paris (1967). She became the first Indian actress to wear a bikini for the cover of Filmfare.
• In the early 1990s, the International Volleyball Federation declared bikinis mandatory for women playing beach volleyball.
• Supporters of the ethical treatment of animals launched a campaign during which vegetarian women wore sports bikinis made from lettuce leaves. So they wanted to draw attention to themselves in order to further incline other people to vegetarianism.
• In 1957, during the Cannes Film Festival, Brigitte Bardot was photographed in a bikini on every beach in southern France.

How to celebrate World Bikini Day?

• Buy a new bikini. Pamper yourself – you can never have too many bikinis. Buy a model that you don’t have yet. Summer is just beginning, and with it, your shopping begins.
• Have a bikini party by the pool or other body of water. July 5 is a great opportunity to have a picnic in nature, on the shore of a lake or river, here you can’t do without a new bikini.
• Think a bikini is not for you? Don’t worry, put on a one-piece swimsuit and head to the sandy shore.

Worldwide Bikini day – this is another reason to have a good rest. Of course, you don’t need a reason to have fun and relax on the beach, but it’s always nice to have an excuse. If someone asks you why you’re not at work on July 5th, the answer is simple: because today is World Bikini Day!

When will we celebrate World Bikini Day??