London - The Gaiety Girls

 At the Gaiety theatre in London at the beginning of the 1890s, The Gaiety Girls were the chorus girls in the Edwardian musical comedies.

These musicals were quite popular, primarily due to these beautiful dancing 'Gaiety Girls' who would appear on-stage in bathing costumes and in the latest English fashions.

These girls were polite, respectable, pretty, elegant young women who frolicked on-stage to English humour, singing and dancing.

Many of the best known London couturiers would design the stage costumes and due to the popularity of the actresses, the theatre became a great way for clothiers to advertise their latest fashions.

The girls became so popular that wealthy gentlemen (nick-named 'stage door Johnnies') would wait outside the stage door in the hope of escorting a girl to dinner. At the time, it had been arranged for the girls to dine at the restaurant Romano's (Strand) at half price giving good exposure to the girls whilst making the restaurant a centre point of London's night-life.

All in all, the Gaiety had become like a dating agency for girls who wished to marry into wealth, and many of the Gaiety Girls successfully married into noble houses.

Further to the good fortune of being the most wanted girls in town, many of the Gaiety Girls also enjoyed substantial acting careers, and one Gaiety Girl by the name of Mabel Russell became a Member of Parliament.