
The history of the scant 2-piece bikini dates back nearly 80 years, designed to draw attention, horror
Fox News
Louis Réard designed and named the first ever bikini in which the bottom half sat below the navel. He hired exotic dancer Micheline Bernardini to pose in front of camera crews.
Louis Réard, a prestigious French mathematician-turned-clothing designer, pieced together the bikini design women have wiggled into for nearly 80 years with the intent of drawing attention. He hoped the bikini featuring newspaper clippings would strike as much shock and horror as the atomic bomb from 1945. The leaf-stopping photographs of Bernardini published on the front page of newspapers did just that. Gabriele Regalbuto is a Senior Editor of SEO at Fox News Digital. Gabriele has a Journalism and Communications degree from West Virginia University. She has worked to produce content for newspapers, magazines, and digital platforms. At Fox, she has assisted in coverage of breaking news events including the 2024 presidential cycle, 2022 midterm elections, Queen Elizabeth II's death, the ongoing war between Russia and Ukraine.
Réard hired Bernardini to saunter around in front of cameras in his G-string bottom and triangle top design when professional runway models refused to rock the next-to-nothing swimsuit.













