Old News is New News at the NYT

As usual the New York Times fashion section is just a tad behind the rest of us, and Thursday's headline is "The Newly Uptight," referring to how fashion is now referencing the Kennedy era, just as I posted last week. The article says:

Recent photo shoots in fashion magazines have alternately tweaked and reinforced the corseted sensibility of the early ’60s. The current Vogue highlights a pair of sheath dresses Slim Keith might have worn to lunch at La Caravelle. One, a brush-stroke floral print by Mr. Kors, is accessorized with black-and-white polka dot opera gloves. No less recherché is the accompanying copy, which extols the chic of a sheath and the “smart suit.”

I LOVE sheath dresses, pencil skirts and slim suits, and I am certainly not mourning the loss of the shapeless sack dress, as I've said many times here. Some people are complaining that it isn't creative, blah blah, I think it all depends what one does with these shapes, and a classic look like these can certainly be made modern - but it takes talent like Alber Elbaz at Lanvin. Michael Kors comes through at the end of the piece with the point that :

“So many young women relish the idea of looking turned out,” Mr. Kors said. “It is the opposite of trying so hard to look undone” — an attitude that, as he argued, women in their 20s are beginning to find stale.

Revisiting the classics is also a way of dispelling the notion that fashion is disposable. Times are changing, Mr. Kors said. “These days it is a badge of honor to wear an outfit more than once.”

Read the whole thing.