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Style Points is a weekly column about how fashion interacts with the wider world.
Among the things needed to re-enter fashion chat for spring, an 18th-century ad with zero real-world practicality was probably not on anyone’s bingo card. Nevertheless, hip-belted panniers or frock coats, and their 16th- and 17th-century cousins, the furtitailles, made their way out of the history books and onto the spring runways. Their reach includes both big names (Dior, Loewe) and rising talents (Elena Velez, Mati Bovan, Del Cor).
The pannier may have been part of the fashion fad at this time: perhaps you associate it with pre-revolutionary Marie Antoinette. That said, designers like Jean-Paul Gaultier and Sarah Burton have riffed on the theme over the past few decades. That’s why Valerie Steele, director and chief curator of the museum at the Fashion Institute of Technology, does not see the trend as a direct return to the era, but refers to modern designers who themselves refer to these themes, such as Christian Lacroix, Alexander McQueen, and Vivienne Westwood. Think of it as a fashion phone game.
Dell Core Spring 2023.
Kimberly Chrisman-Campbellincluding fashion historian and book author Dresses: Introducing Modern Feminism in the 20th Century; He agrees. “I think all of these collections were filtered through the lens of 1980s historicism—the New Romantics, the Westwood mini-crinie and the Lacroix pouf.” “The ’80s and the 18th century were an era of excess and high fashion, so it’s important that they come back as we come out of the epidemic and get excited about fashion and clothing.
Lowe’s Spring 2023.
Chrisman-Campbell says, “A bigger dress means more fabric, and therefore more money and energy. A solid structure like a pannier or farthingale supported all that fabric more effectively and comfortably than layers of petticoats.
Dresses
Dresses
While these styles were difficult to wear, they were also quite liberating, or at least somewhat threatening to the social order. Male critics attacked them for their unnaturalness in shaping their bodies, using language very similar to later criticisms of corsets, padded bras, Spanx, and plastic surgery. The writing was also thought to encourage promiscuity; Because what you are wearing obscures whether or not she is pregnant. “People assume that in the past there were women [completely] Victims of patriotism,” says Steele. “But while patriarchal society was very powerful, and women had very few legal or socioeconomic rights, let alone political, women still had a lot of say when it came to presenting their bodies. And one of the ways they say ‘I’m a grown man, take me’ is by presenting themselves.
Even if we don’t see panniers coming back off the runway—door frames need to be expanded, for one thing—this idea of women’s space-taking remains provocative four centuries later. Steele cites British psychologist John Carl Flugel, who wrote about the relationship between big clothes. “The size of this dress just says ‘be careful,'” she said.
Matty Bovan Spring 2023.
Such sartorial real estate still has the same effect. “In the past, extravagant clothing was a way for women who had money but no real voice in society to make themselves seen and heard,” Chrisman-Campbell said. “Fashion today is relatively affordable, and many more women are financially independent enough to participate in fashion. But, at the same time, they’re being silenced or ignored in other areas. It’s hard to ignore someone who takes up physical space, and fashion is an effective way to do that— We saw a good example of this with Thames at the Oscars, with trends like bimbocore and “nipple-free 2.0” for Dobbs He’s also buying space weapons in high fashion.
It explains why many designers have a pre-guillotine Marie Antoinette on their mood board. Not to mention that in a time of inflation, economic inequality, and a bank run, her happy hour can’t be comfortable. In the year As Steele says of Lacroix’s pre-crash tactics in the 1980s: “They were pretty much dancing on the edge of the cliff.” It is like before the revolution.
For Steele, though, the trend reads like social commentary and the swing of a seasonal pendulum. “If you emphasized the bare body last season and you emphasize the body this season, you’re emphasizing the body in both situations,” she said. In Care Of”
ELLE Fashion Features Director
Véronique Hyland is ELLE’s fashion features director and author of the book. dress code, He was chosen as one New York Best books of the year. Her article has been previously published New York Times Magazine, new york, W, new york magazine, Harper’s Bazaar, And Condé Nast Traveller.
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