Historical undergarments.

I'm thinking of writing some historical pieces but I always run into a problem with ladies undergarments. Does anyone know when what we would think of as modern panties/nickers came into common use as opposed to bloomer or pantaloons type garments? I'm under the impression it was sometime around the very early 20th century.

I bet if you put "history of underwear" in a google search engine you'd find out.

I've researched this a bit, and if I recall, panties became popular in the 1920s. With women, I mean.

Whereas they've always been popular with men

I have some historical undergarments of my own - they're full of holes and the elastic has gone slack.

How can this happen? Let me guess, you are not married?

Correct as usual, Mati!

That is probably because there was rationing and it was hard to get good material during World War II when they were made.

I'm thinking of taking them to the Antiques Roadshow to get them valued.

You should - I saw an episode last year with just such an item being examined. You'd be surprised what they're worth.
I found this transcript of that bit of the show on i-player-text:

"Note the remarkable way in which the exhausted elastic is most stretched in the back - this, of course, is typical of 1940's English underpants and their wearers. We see how the holes vary in shape and size, reflecting, I believe, the greater freedom of choice that emerged following post-war rationing and the increasing diversity of the population. And I find the colour simply fascinating - a very 50's shade of grey to my mind, and really quite rare these days. Manufactured in Oldham by the firm of Royston and Sons in ... probably 1947 - the label here, barely legible now of course, was made of silk, which only became available after the war. Have they been in the family long?

Now, I saw a very similar pair at auction last year which fetched £4,000, but as these are such rare gems and come up so seldom, I think they could be worth as much as £4,500 ... £5,000 at a stretch.

A remarkable and rather lovely item. Thank you so much for bringing them along."