Playing the Oldies : Fashion: California designers put a ‘90s spin on ‘60s hits. New fabrics make them easier to move in.
It’s going to be a 1960s summer in Southern California.
Indeed, an entire decade of disparate ‘60s styles has been squeezed into the upcoming fashion season. The looks range from trim A-line dresses like those worn by Jackie Kennedy to flower-festooned Mod Squad fare. Accessories include thigh-high patent leather boots, structured handbags, wide headbands, peace signs and Op Art prints. And many of the extreme silhouettes--miniskirts and slim pants among them--seem to work better the second time around.
New York and California designers are providing the bulk of the styles. Some of the best looks come from Los Angeles-based lines such as Van Buren, Lianne Barnes, Robin Piccone, Laundry, Hoda, Holly Sharp and Saelee.
Maggie Barry, one of the creative forces behind Van Buren, points out that fabric technology has caught up with the futuristic visions of 25 and 30 years ago, resulting in more wearable clothes.
In the 1960s, Barry says, clothing was often uncomfortable because makers used heavy, foam-backed polyester knits and vinyls. The soft, fluid fabrics available now, such as washed silk, wool crepe, rayon jersey and cotton knits infused with Lycra, move with the body.
These new textiles are more performance-oriented (the stretch fabrics do not lose their shape; the synthetics have more breathability) than the double knits of the past.
Paris-based Andre Courreges, one of the major fashion influences of the 1960s, has recognized the compatibility of his 30-year-old designs with the new fabrics. He recently told his New York representative: “I did the designs in the ‘60s but they were meant for the ‘90s.”
Courreges, 68, used to be referred to as “Couturier of the Space Age,” and is credited with introducing minidresses and white patent leather go-go boots and using industrial-size zippers.
Even though he had not produced a line in five years, the engineer/architect/fashion designer has risen like a phoenix and is crisscrossing the United States with his new ready-to-wear collection. Last week he was at Neiman Marcus, Beverly Hills, and he will be at I. Magnin, Newport Beach, next Thursday and Friday. He says he is a futurist who cares nothing for the past, but his new clothes look remarkably like his old ones.
Valerie Steele, a professor at the Fashion Institute of Technology in New York City, views the retro movement as a fashion statement, not a political statement.
“Sixties-inspired fashions are not the same as the actual fashions worn during the 1960s,” Steele says. The clothes look similar, but the context has changed. Overtones of sexual liberation are not attached to miniskirts today as they were in the past.
Gail Sekiguchi, fashion director for Southern California Nordstrom stores, says customers fall into two groups: young teen-agers and thirty-something women. The first group is enthralled with the newness of the look, she says. And older women tell her it is fun to have a second go at a style from their youth.
One positive aspect of the retro trend is that more women can wear its shorter hemlines than last summer’s short spandex dresses, Sekiguchi says, especially if they opt for A-line styles, which are looser and more forgiving. “Once customers put it (the A-line) on they find it very flattering. And it is an item that will carry through for fall.”
Another ‘60s style in wide circulation is the baby-doll dress. But Marilyn Harding, vice president of the Tobe Report, a New York fashion forecasting service, warns that the Empire waistline is not for everyone; because the fullness falls from the bust line it works best on Twiggy-like figures.
Sixties styles are finding an appreciative audience on the West and East coasts. But the South, except for Dallas, is passing on the trend, Harding says, and the Midwest seems cool to the style.
“It is not uncommon for fashion to repeat itself,” she says. “People are more comfortable looking back (rather) than embracing the future and the unknown.” This is especially true, she says, at the threshold of a new century.
But the reinvention of ‘60s style is not finding universal acceptance because it is viewed as avant garde by many buyers, Harding says. And the fact that the styles are being interpreted by designers known to be on the cutting edge reinforces this impression.
At the time they were introduced, ‘60s silhouettes were considered bold and futuristic. For some fashion experts, ‘90s clothing with a ‘60s influence is considered much the same.
The clothes are presented in a way that often drives potential customers away, says Marsha Barrett, fashion director for Neiman Marcus. “The ‘60s is too easy a handle,” she says. “Too many stores are using this as a catchall phrase and doing it badly. They put mannequins in their store windows loaded down with beehive hairdos, cat’s eye-shaped sunglasses and an Op Art print dress. This is not what it is about.”
Barrett sees the ‘60s influences in bright color combinations, vibrant prints and black-and-white eye-twisting patterns, but she considers simple dresses, unitards, and oversize shirts worn with leggings the most powerful fashion images this season.
For the women who love the look, now is the time to indulge. Harding predicts the fashion time line will race through the ‘60s by fall. Then we will wake up and smell the incense--a neo-hippie look from the early 1970s will be with us. She cites reports from the European shows now in progress--fringed shirts and hip-hugging pants have been seen on the runways.
