French maid
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French maid refers to a strongly modified style of servant’s dress that evolved from typical maids’ black and white afternoon uniforms of the nineteenth century (and their later use by stereotypical characters in risqué burlesque dramas of the bedroom farce variety). The designs of the French maid dress can range widely from a conservative look to very revealing. It is now often but by no means always associated with cosplay, sexual roleplaying, and fetishism. Depending on design details, some forms can be classified as lingerie.
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[edit] Components
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Occasionally included in the costume (and now associated with the name) is a 'push-up bra' to enhance the female bust. The dress usually has a short, revealing skirt (although sometimes this can be long. The dress is frequently corseted in the front, or may include a pinafore. A wide variety of costumes are manufactured and marketed under the “French maid” description today, or if one has creativity, time and sewing skills, the costume can be easily and cheaply made. The manufactured costumes range from fairly modest dresses extending well down the thigh or above the knees to transparent chiffon fabric or outright lingerie ensembles that cover very little.
The classic French maid costume is usually a short and clingy dress — which is frequently corseted in the front; ideally silk, satin, or a fabric resembling it — trimmed with shirred white lace with a revealing neckline. Typically, they include a small white apron or a pinafore. The skirt area of the dress is sometimes pleated.
Common accessories include a frill worn in the hair or a tiara, a feather duster, and sometimes white lace cuffs and collar. If the dress has sleeves, they are usually short with shoulder puffs. If the dress has an apron, sometimes it is shaped like a heart with white lace fringes on the hems. If knickers are worn with it, they are usually white and ruffled,[citation needed] and the dress is sometimes short enough to display them, especially when the wearer bends over. A corset or a layered white petticoat may be worn under the dress. The ensemble is almost always completed with black stockings and high heels.
[edit] Wear
The costumes are frequently worn to costume parties, and also used in drama/theater. They are sometimes worn for sexual roleplaying or by BDSM practitioners, either on brief occasions, or as a routine form of servitude to the dominant partner.
Among cross-dressing female-dominated men, there is also an extensive Sissy (transgender) subculture with men roleplaying as submissive "sissy maids" wearing a feminine French maid costume.
French Maid costumes also feature in mainstream media from time to time. Notable films include Joanne Whalley in The Man Who Knew Too Little (1997), and Colleen Camp as a sexy French maid in Clue (film) (1985), a murder mystery spoof in which she becomes a suspect, and later, a victim. In Friends with Money (2006), Jennifer Aniston dresses as a French maid for her boyfriend, first vacuuming and using a feather duster, then making love whilst still in costume, thus fulfilling all the elements of the standard fantasy role. Aniston played the maid seductress again in a guest role on the 3rd episode of the 3rd season of the NBC TV series 30 Rock. And on the Desperate Housewives series, Lynette (Felicity Huffman) wears a French maid outfit she bought at a lingerie store to spice up her marriage.[episode needed]
