Gloves that leave the fingers exposed, covering only the hand and thumb—a garment of partial coverage that has moved between utility and ornament throughout its history, valued for its ability to keep the hand warm while preserving dexterity.
The fingerless glove has existed in various forms since the Middle Ages, when laborers wore fingerless leather gloves to protect their palms while leaving their fingers free for detailed work. In the nineteenth century, fingerless lace mitts were worn by women as a fashion accessory, covering the back of the hand and the wrist while leaving the fingers bare for activities that required fine motor control: needlework, letter-writing, turning pages.
The fingerless glove experienced a revival in the 1970s and 1980s as a punk and new wave fashion staple. Worn by musicians and their fans, the fingerless glove signaled an allegiance to street culture and a rejection of the formality associated with conventional gloves. The lace mitt of the Victorian lady and the leather fingerless glove of the punk musician are the same garment, separated by a century and a complete inversion of social meaning.
In contemporary fashion, fingerless gloves have been adopted as a cold-weather accessory that allows the use of touch-screen devices, giving the ancient form a new technological relevance. The mitt persists because it solves a problem that full gloves cannot: the need to keep the hand warm without sacrificing the hand’s ability to work.
