What to Wear to a Pin Up Pageant

It’s amazing how a just a small application of blood-red lipstick, an animal print form-fitting outfit, big hair and a pair of four-inch platform heels can quickly transform the average girl into a car show modern pin up.

With this type of transformation, for the novice modern pin up such as myself, suddenly the day turns into a whirl-wind tea cup ride of people wanting to take pictures posing with you, pictures of you with their cars and pictures of you doing the most humdrum tasks: such as eating, sitting, pouring beer, drinking and walking.

This is what happened Saturday, Sept. 25, while participating in the pin up pageant at the Yolo Throwdown in Woodland, CA.  The Yolo Throwdown is a music festival and car show featuring classic cars, food, vendors and a handful of excellent bands such as the Cockfight Kings, The Fortunate Few, and the Cash Prophets, (an exceptional Johnny Cash tribute band!)

The pin up pageant offered an opportunity for me and the five other pin up hopefuls to wear 1950s period inspired clothing and model to a crowd of cheering fans and admirers.  The crowd of some 200 onlookers cheered loudly as all the pin ups nervously stood in line waiting for the chance to pose for the cameras.  Voting for the pin up was determined on the amount of cheers each contest received as she posed. 

Although the pageant was a close finish, unfortunately not everyone can be crowned the Yolo Throwdown Pin up Queen.  Needless to say I was robbed of this victory!  But Laura, the Pin up in the blue polka-dot cocktail dress, was deservedly crowned the winner.

From an anthropological viewpoint, there are only a few different types of people that regularly frequent the car show events.  There are the old men gathering around the exposed hot rod engines, drinking coffee at 2 p.m. and reminiscing about the cars they bought and sold throughout their lifetimes.

There are the middle-aged men hovering over the hot rods and muscle cars, balancing on the brink of a mid-life crisis, remembering their high school days and dreaming of the chance to relive them.

Then there are the “rockabilly” or “greasers” usually the band members or band followers, reliving the 1950s era subculture, wearing cuffed Levi’s 501 jeans, plain T-shirts or pearl button western shirts, slicked back hair, chained wallets and Converse Chuck Taylor All-Stars shoes.

And last but not least, there are the women of the car shows.  Not the women who are paid to be there in their scantily clad outfits and bikinis.  The women, who like the men, live and breathe the car show culture.  Women, who glamorously wear vintage clothing, embody the 1950s era yet add the modern twist of tattoos and body piercings.  Women who represent the modern day pin up.

Pin up art originated in the early 1900s as glamorous drawings and paintings of models; an era when even the slightest exposed skin on a model was viewed as seductive art.  The pin-up art gained popularity in the 1940s and 50s with models such as Betty Grable, Rita Hayworth and Jane Russell boosting the morale for troops off fighting WWII.

During WWII and the Korean War many pin up models inspired artwork painted on the front of bomber and fighter planes, known as nose art.  The nose art distinguished each plane and its crew from other similar planes, sometimes taking on the persona of a popular cartoon character, a girl friend, a popular actress, or the plane itself.  Unfortunately after the Korean War, the Armed Forces did away with the pin up nose art.

Although the original era of the pin up is gone, the spirit of the pin up is still highly visible as the modern day pin up in the car show culture.