A bikini is a women's two-piece swimsuit that features one piece on top that covers the breasts, and a second piece on the bottom: the front covering the pelvis but usually exposing the navel.
In May 1946, Parisian fashion designer Jacques Heim released a two-piece swimsuit design that he named the Atome ('Atom') and advertised as "the smallest swimsuit in the world". Like swimsuits of the era, it covered the wearer's belly button, and it failed to attract much attention.
In 1949, France banned the bikini from being worn on its coastlines; Germany banned the bikini from public swimming pools until the 1970s, and some communist groups condemned the bikini as a "capitalist decadence".
The bikini gained increased exposure and acceptance as film stars like Brigitte Bardot, Raquel Welch, and Ursula Andress wore them and were photographed on public beaches and seen in film. The minimalist bikini design became common in most Western countries by the mid-1960s.
