The American Mrs. Amelia Bloomer denounced the skirt style 
that needed so many petticoats, suggesting a bifurcated 
garment as a solution.  Six petticoats at least were needed 
to hold the wide full skirts out.  The petticoats used 
under one skirt could weigh as much as 14 pounds, so 
clothes were uncomfortably hot and heavy in summer. Mrs. 
Amelia Jenks Bloomer (1818-1894), caused quite a stir when 
she wrote an article for her feminist publication 'The 
Lily'.  She tried to promote the idea of women abandoning 
their petticoats for a bi-furcated garment later known as 
the bloomer fashion. She suggested that woman would find 
trousers like those worn by Turkish women easier to wear 
than their voluminous heavy skirts.  The baggy bloomer 
trousers she liked reached to the ankle, were frill cuffed 
and worn with a simple knee length skirt and bodice. She 
thought it a sensible and hygienic option to the boned 
fashion bodices and long weighty skirts of the time. 

The baggy trouser outfit was worn by a minority, including 
the Rational Dress Reform Society. It never gained 
popularity until after Mrs. Bloomer's death. Mrs. Bloomer 
abandoned trousers in 1857 when she admitted she found the 
cage crinoline comfortable compared to the weight of 
petticoats. A year after her death in 1895 some women 
accepted a form of the bloomer fashion style. The trousers 
now called bloomers, were adopted as suitable cycling wear 
for ladies.