Black underwear began as a rule rather than a choice. By the 1870s American fashion advice expected women in mourning to wear black corsets and petticoats; one 1876 advice column put it flatly: "Ladies who adopt the fashionable mourning, must wear black corsets." Black corsets were sold as fashion at the same time, and by 1890 one writer, Ellen Osborn, mocked black undergarments as "a luxury of grief."
Today black is the base color of most lingerie ranges. Nylon and polyester take a deep, even black, and black lace over nude mesh is the standard way to make lace read sharply against skin. Under white or sheer tops black shows through clearly; under dark clothes it disappears. Faded black turns greyish or slightly brown, which is where the classifier starts confusing it with charcoal.
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