The pantsuit — because not every girl wants to wear ruffles and bows.
Isaac Newton concluded that for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. In fall fashion, the third law of motion translates as this: For every Louis Vuitton French-maid hooker’s delight, there is an equal and opposite Edwardian she-gentleman à la Ann Demeulemeester.
Action and reaction. Girls dressing like boys, and men dressing like women: It’s been around since Adam and Eve and their matching fig leaves. As Julie Wheelwright, author of the cross-dressing classic Amazons and Military Maids, points out: “There were always women who wore trousers: women working in mines in the 19th century and in industrial professions in which they had to cover their legs for safety reasons. And fin de siècle women like [novelist] Radclyffe Hall, the journalist Natalie Barney (Colette’s lover) and Gertrude Stein were all forerunners. They wore men’s clothes to express their desire for power and men’s privileges.”
But while it was tolerated on factory floors and in radical literary salons, cross-dressing was verboten in polite society until the early 20th century. Coco Chanel broke the ice by showing up at hunting parties in her boyfriend’s jodhpurs and silk ties. She also converted other staples of the gentleman’s wardrobe to the women’s cause, like tweed hacking jackets, wool cardigans and sailor pants. Though she wore dress trousers herself, even Coco did not have the gumption to sell them to her society clientele.
Pantsuit chic is a Saint Laurent invention. The 1966 tuxedo suit he called “Le Smoking” got plenty of women kicked out of good restaurants on both sides of the Atlantic. Saint Laurent’s current successor, Stefano Pilati, plays the house androgyny card this season with a host of generously pleated and tapered trousers — some in black leather — and long, fluid, pinstriped jackets. He also introduced the Unisex capsule collection last spring. Billed as a womenswear take on YSL menswear, its washed-silk blazers, crepe de Chine pants and silk-organza trench coats “maintain the men’s silhouettes while offering an implicit femininity,” says the accompanying press release. “The anatomy of the female body has been considered and proportions adjusted to reassign the menswear looks to women.”
Find out how Dior and Yves Saint Lauret made the pantsuit work on the next page ...
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