See-through fabrics: They are a staple this season, but can they work in real …

Catwalk collections are there to make an impact, to showcase the extreme version of a designer’s ideas. These are often modified for modesty by the time they are translated  into the commercial versions that end up in store. Still, sheer fabrics abound this season, but can you incorporate them into real life without being arrested for indecent exposure, or falling foul of your company’s dress code?

“This trend can work in everyday life,” says Lauren Thurston, a junior buyer at Figleaves.com, a specialist lingerie and swimwear site. “The key is adapting it to suit your lifestyle. You could wear a body under a sheer blouse to provide more coverage for work. Invisible lingerie allows the clothes to do the talking, while bright colours and neon make a feature out of your underwear for a night out. We wouldn’t recommend going for a sheer bra under a see-through top though.”

Kelly Dunmore, a lingerie stylist at Rigby Peller, agrees: “There’s a sliding scale to this trend, but the key thing to bear in mind is that your lingerie needs to complement the overall look not distract from it. Lingerie decisions need to look intentional – whether this is choosing a style and colour that works harmoniously or intentionally contrasts.” As Rigby Peller is blessed with a Royal Warrant, one wonders if the Queen takes such sage advice to heart.

Regardless of style, fit is the most important factor when choosing underwear – diaphanous fabrics are often also clingy or tight, adding an extra element of exposure. “Well-fitting lingerie is an absolute must-have with this trend, regardless of size or whether you’re going for subtle or sexy,” instructs Dunmore. “Well-fitted pieces will not only help achieve the perfect silhouette, but ensure that layering stays in place and that lines remain clean and minimal. This is especially true with strapless or bandeau pieces, which can slip out of place and give you overspill, whatever your size.”

 

But it’s not just a translucent top half that needs tackling: dresses, skirts and even trousers come in sheer fabrics this season, meaning that VPL (visible panty line, that Nineties’ sartorial scourge) is back at an unprecedented level. Dunmore thinks that Spanx shorts are a less than aesthetically-pleasing solution, a fact that anyone who has trussed themselves up in teeny-tiny Lycra can agree with. Instead, she recommends invisible briefs for their smooth lines – thanks to a lack of seams – and full coverage, handy if an errant breeze threatens to recreate Marilyn Monroe’s infamous scene from The Seven Year Itch.

Shapewear may not be known for its sex-appeal, but it has evolved since the Nineties with designs that less resemble medical equipment and varied degrees of control. Spanx, probably the best-known brand on the foundation garment market, has launched a range of more comfortable briefs and thongs that are designed for everyday use.

Whether you can see it or not, a correctly fitting bra will immediately change the way the clothes on top look, in part by shaping the body underneath, but also the way you feel. The link between underwear and emotional and physical wellbeing is obvious – feeling supported physically has an impact on posture and back health, as well as body image and self-confidence. “Wearing a good-fitting and supportive bra can be a revelation,” says Thurston. “You feel more comfortable, supported and more confident.”

Priya Bal, lingerie and beachwear buyer at Harvey Nichols, agrees that fit is often a deciding factor, even for the department store’s trend-led customers: “Our customer is fearlessly stylish, and looking for a variety of styles they can experiment with. Many customers enter the department with an idea of what lingerie they are looking for, often more detailed pieces that are made to be on show. Once they speak to our expert stylists they realise that buying the right size bra can really make a difference to their shape, not to mention how it makes them feel.”

Interestingly, given how international Harvey Nichols’ customers are, a wide range of skin tones is not their first priority, says Bal. “While we offer a range of nude tones, what our customer is really looking for is a good-fitting bra. We find that this is ranked higher than the shade of the piece.”

True as this may be, having to choose between fit and colour-matching is nevertheless frustrating for women of colour. Not least Ade Hassan, who last year founded Nubian Skin, a range of lingerie and hosiery in tones from creamy coffee to rich brown, in order to redefine a concept of nude that, in the UK at least, has been too narrow for too long.

After all, whether you opt for sheer delights or not, shouldn’t everybody be able to build their wardrobe on a firm foundation? 

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American Apparel are erasing nipples from their models

Is this a misinterpretation of the ‘Free the Nipple’ campaign or are American Apparel losing the plot? In what seems like a very odd attempt at trying to de-sexualise their brand, the marketing team has decided that nipples are more of a blemish than a fixed part of the human anatomy, choosing to airbrush them away completely.

For a brand that markets itself as being progressive, with their attitudes against the sweatshop industry and their regular campaigning for immigration reform and LGBQT rights, this move is a strangely regressive choice to make in their representation of the female form. Considering the company likes playing the ‘empowering women to be sexual’ card to defend their past blatantly objectifying ad campaigns, their recent endeavour to steer away from their racy reputation adds a layer of shame to how women should feel about their bodies; not only do nipples not make the cut, but pubic hair has been shaved off with it.

Since American Apparel’s takeover by lawsuit-free Paula Schneider, the new CEO is aiming to make the brand ‘relevant to millennials’ without relying on ‘pornographic’ marketing tactics as has been done in the past. However, by removing the very visible nips of the models of AA’s sheer lingerie collection, it implies various negative connotations about women that pretty much says that our bodies are the problem.

The impossible beauty standards that the brand have attempted (emphasis on ‘attempted’) to stray from in the past, including their use of ethnically diverse models, women of different sizes and ages, trans women, and women who choose to remain au naturale downstairs, have now been backpedalled to fit in with a more mainstream aesthetic. The calls to stop using gratuitous  advertising tactics seem to have been misunderstood to the degree that they’re ok with very underage-looking models posing in thongs, yet a female adult’s nipples through a sheer bra is a no go. An adult woman’s body is deemed more indecent than the sexualisation of children.

Their decision to photoshop away pubic hair and any semblance of a vulva is a contradictory one as well, seeing as they repped the merkins on their mannequins with such audacity last year. The choice to erase the models’ nether regions altogether rather than just change their provocative poses raises concerns about how AA will tackle their over-sexualisation problem. Backstepping from the global movement toward gender equality by putting a taboo on natural female bodily appendages won’t reduce sexualisation so much as contribute to censorship.

The models now resemble more Barbie than human; let’s just hope they leave the belly button intact.

New and old ads below for comparison (NSFW):

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