[7][8] His revolutionary and controversial design included a bottom that "extended from the midriff to the upper thigh"[9] and was "held up by shoestring laces that make a halter around the neck.

He did not initially intend to produce the monokini commercially,[12] but was persuaded by Susanne Kirtland of Look to make it available to the public.

Gernreich may have chosen his use of the word monokini (mono meaning 'single') through back-formation by interpreting the bi of bikini as the Latin prefix bi- ('two'), denoting a two-piece swimsuit.

In its December 1962 issue, Sports Illustrated remarked, "He has turned the dancer's leotard into a swimsuit that frees the body.

[20] At the end of 1963, editor Susanne Kirtland of Look called Gernreich and asked him to submit a design for the suit to accompany a trend story along futuristic lines.

Gernreich finally chose a design that ended around mid-torso and then added two straps that rose between the breasts and were tied around the neck.

[21] When a photo shoot was arranged on Montego Bay in the Bahamas,[22] all five models hired for the session refused to wear the design.

If you are wearing a fashion that does not have a top as part of its design and hold your arms over your bosom, you're going along with the whole prudish, teasey thing like a Playboy bunny.

"[24] On June 12, 1964 the San Francisco Chronicle featured a photo of a woman in a monokini with her exposed breasts clearly visible on its front page.

[17] Claxton's frontal image of Moffit modeling the swimsuit was subsequently published by Life and numerous other publications.

[21] The photo catapulted Moffitt into instant celebrity, reportedly resulting in her receiving everything from marriage proposals to death threats.

In New York City, leading stores like B. Altman & Company, Lord & Taylor, Henri Bendel, Splendiferous and Parisette placed orders.

"[35] On August 13, 1985, Los Angeles Fashion Group produced a gala at the Wiltern Theatre to benefit the Rudi Gernreich Design Scholarship Fund.

She told the Los Angeles Times,[35] The regional director of the Fashion Group, Sarah Worman, believed that the swimsuit was "the single most important idea he ever had—the one that changed the way women dressed all over the Western world."

[17] The Vatican denounced the swimsuit, and the L'Osservatore Romano said the "industrial-erotic adventure" of the topless bathing suit "negates moral sense."

[9] In the 1960s, the monokini influenced the sexual revolution by emphasizing a woman's personal freedom of dress, even when her attire was provocative and exposed more skin than had been the norm during the more conservative 1950s.

[40] As the suit gained notoriety, the New York City Police Department was strictly instructed by the commissioner of parks to arrest any woman wearing a monokini.

[37] In France in 1964, Roger Frey led the prosecution of the use of the monokini, describing it as: "a public offense against the sense of decency, punishable according to article 330 of the penal code.

[17] Jean-Luc Godard, a founding mover of French New Wave cinema, incorporated monokini footage shot by Jacques Rozier in Riviera into his film A Married Woman, but it was edited out by the censors.

"[36] When Toni Lee Shelley, a 19-year-old artists model, wore the topless bathing suit to the North Avenue beach in Chicago in 1964, 12 police officers responded, 11 to control and disperse the public and photographers, and one to arrest her.

[17] On 12 June 1964, the San Francisco Chronicle published on its front page a photo of a woman with clearly visible, exposed breasts wearing a monokini.

[48] Davey Rosenberg,[49] the publicist of the Condor Club in San Francisco's North Beach district, bought Gernreich's monokini from Joseph Magnin, and gave it to former prune picker, file clerk, and waitress Carol Doda to wear for her act.

"[29] Within a few days, women were baring their breasts in many of the clubs lining San Francisco's Broadway St., ushering in the era of the topless bar.

[17]: 25 San Francisco public officials tolerated the topless bars until April 22, 1965, when Doda was arrested along with Pete Mattioli and Gino del Prete, owners of the Condor Club.

Hundreds of protesters gathered outside the police department, calling for release of both Doda and free speech activist Mario Savio, held in the same station.

Judge Friedman's memorandum to opposing attorneys reads, "Whether acts ... are lewd and dissolute depends not on any individual's interpretation or personal opinion, but on the consensus of the entire community...".

[51] Doda rapidly became a symbol of sexual freedom, while topless restaurants, along with shoeshine parlors, ice-cream stands and girl bands proliferated in San Francisco and elsewhere.

The cutouts are connected with varying fabrics, including mesh, chain, and other materials to link the top and bottom sections together.

In 1985, four weeks before his death, Gernreich unveiled the lesser-known pubikini, a topless bathing suit that exposed the wearer's mons pubis.

[55][56][57] It was a thin, V-shaped, thong-style bottom[58] that in the front featured a tiny strip of fabric that exposed the wearer's pubic hair.