Men’s buttons are on the right to make it easy to do up with one hand for right-handed people.
When buttons were invented, only the wealthy wore them. Wealthy women had maids who would do the buttons up for them, and so the buttons are on the left so that they are easier for someone facing you to do up.
Old guy here, I know, and it’s a pain. I’m skinny so I sometimes order women’s clothes for the fit. Also have a bunch of hand-me-downs from old girlfriends. Sucks trying to button the girl version.
Same goes for zippers! They’re reversed as well.
Me and my cousin were both skiny af when entering teens, both of us bought these Jean jackets that fit us so well that we don’t remeber buying something that snug before, both of us were very proud of these and wore them all the time until one elder cousin noticed the flipped button side, started making fun of us and to top it off the tag on jackets had a very small 3 font size “for women” under the brand name.
We still get shamed for wearing that by other cousin.
Memories.
It makes women’s blouses more expensive to dry clean, because they can’t be pressed on the same machine that does men’s shirts without breaking the buttons.
Damn you patriarchy.
Too bad that they can’t make a female version of that machine. After all, women are a rare minority that only make up half of all human
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Your head’s in the right place. A lady was expected to be dressed and undressed by servants. But even a non-aristocratic woman would want to dress the same as the courtly ladies, and not wear men’s clothes so women’s’ shirts got buttons on the left side, regardless of the wearer’s class and the idea just persisted through to the present.
If you think about it, you’ll see how little sense it makes. Back before things like cars, motels, and telephones, having an affair was complicated. You couldn’t just pop over for a quickie. On the other hand, servants were cheap. Even a cop or a school teacher could afford at least one maid.
Yeah learning this sucked. Cuter shirts but harder to button
I’ve heard this and wonder why don’t they just change it? Do women prefer it this way now?
There’s a lot more demand (or at least much more vocal demand) for women’s clothing to have pockets. You can see how far that’s gotten.
I presume the buttons are just something you get used to.
Tbh I wouldn’t even want to get the button side changed. After buttoning my shirts one specific way my entire life it’d be such a pain in the arse to have it mirrored.
The easiest way is to not care and just buy the clothes that benefit you the most.
It would require changing the entire womens clothing industry, machines would need to be replaced, the entire global workforce would need to be retrained, same for designers, then it would take decades to for women to relearn the technique of doing up buttons on all clothes.
All changes to the design and production processes would cost billions, and annoy their entire customer base, all of that for a relatively minor issue.
You replace the machines when they wear out. If they need to be replaced at all, I doubt they have machines specific for genders. I expect it’s just a setting.
Relearn how to do up their buttons? It would be easier.
I am not saying that relearning to do up buttons is hard, but have you ever tried to relearn a basic skill in a different way, it can be surprisingly annoying.
…this literally makes it easier.
Not in the short term, but in the long term, absolutely.
Is this to do with being right-handed?
Yes, most men are right handed, and most maids who helped women dress in the past were right handed.
This whole sentence could be summed up as “humans are mostly right handed”.
That’s interesting. I never would have thought of this. I use two hands to button and never considered what side anything was on. Perhaps because I have both men’s and women’s shirts?
There are many theories about why, but nobody knows for sure.
It is very well known…
It was common for richer women to have chamber maids helping them dress, so clothes were designed to accomodate them, putting the buttons in the reverse, makes the chamber maids work easier, then it just stuck.
That’s just one theory.
Another theory is that it isn’t about the buttons or the ease, but actually the direction of the topmost fabric.
Men having a sword on the left side could draw the sword with the right hand without getting caught in the shirt.
Women breastfeeding with the baby on the left arm could more easily cover up when the shirt opening over the baby. Women riding a horse in sidesaddle style would also avoid the wind blowing their shirt open when buttoned that way.
Thats fair, I was given the chamber maid explanation inthe past, but these explanations are also resonable.
