Crop top
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Crop tops (also cropped tops) are T-shirts or blouses that are cut off, resulting in the exposure of some of the wearer's abdomen, worn by both men and women.
The halfshirt (or bellyshirt) is a variety of shirt that is cut off from the bottom of the chest and below usually worn by women and occasionally men.
Though several cultures around the world have featured midriff-baring tops for centuries, the style became a temporary men's fad in the United States in the 1980s. Originally based on American football jerseys which were cropped above the navel to make them cooler in hot weather, it became popular to cut t-shirts above the midriff for daily wear.
Several major apparel companies released lines of ready-made bellyshirts in the 1980s, including Nike, Inc., Adidas and several others. It became common to see bellyshirts casually worn at school and in other semi-formal public places. Many of these shirts were quite short, between 15-17 inches in length, causing a large area of a man's belly and bellybutton to be exposed.
Bellyshirts became scarce in the United States by the end of the 1980s and were virtually gone by the early years of the following decade. In the mid-1990s, bellyshirts saw a resurgence as a popular top, this time for women, and often much less short than the late male version. These shirts have remained popular into the 2000s. Extremely short crop tops may reveal Australian cleavage.
Other common names for these shirts have included: belly shirt, half shirt, halfshirt, crop top, tummy top, short shirt, cutoff shirt.
Several famous entertainers have become renowned for wearing bellyshirts, such as Britney Spears, Christina Aguilera, and Shania Twain.
