Sexuality+and+Fashion

Caroline Schoenberger ** Sexuality and Fashion ** Throughout history, fashion and sex appeal have gone hand in hand. Women laced themselves up in corsets until they could barely breathe for hundreds of years to have slender waists, and in the 1920s flappers wore short dresses which shocked conservatives. While what society considers sexy has greatly changed over the years, there is always the connection between fashion and sexuality. From December 2008 to June 2009, the Museum at the Fashion Institute of Technology, there was a featured exhibit covering the evolution of fashion and sexuality. Titled “Seduction,” this exhibition explored the different trends from the mid 1700s to the present and how they related to sexuality. In the 1700s, form-fitting clothing was considered more modest than loose fitting dresses, with focus on the corset and waist of the woman. During the Roaring Twenties, women’s’ hemlines rose with the flapper style dresses, which was symbolic of “th e newly liberated sexuality of the modern woman” (“Seduction,” 2009). Each new decade brought in new sexual styles, with the 1930s bringing silk draped gowns, the 1960s introducing the obvious sexual mini skirt, and the 1980s focusing on body-conscious styles. Today, society is constantly bombarded with sexual fashions. Celebrities are constantly photographed in overly sexual outfit choices. For example, Lady Gaga has refused to wear pants as part of her many extreme outfit choices (Blasberg 2010).
 * Sexuality and Fashion in History **

Over time, everyday fashion has pushed boundaries farther and farther for what is considered acceptable everyday attire. It was not that long ago that it was not acceptable for women to wear pants out in public, let alone wear them to their jobs. This is true in how reveling clothing has become. In today’s society, no one looks twice at a woman in a low cut dress; however, in the past most women would ever be seen wearing a dress that reveling. The only women who dressed so sexually were prostitutes, and now there is a very fine line dividing normal apparel and typical prostitute apparel. A big trend in recent seasons has been the over-the-knee boots, which in the past had been most commonly associated with prostitution. (Blasberg 2010). Sexuality has pushed its way into everyday fashion in so many ways that it is difficult to decipher the difference between acceptable and trashy.
 * Everyday Fashion **

Top fashion designers strive to create new and exciting looks that they hope will catch on with the fashion elite. Designers have to take risks to be successful, and often these risks come in pushing the boundaries of what is fashion and what is trashy. Of course, designers know that one thing will always sell: sex. Designer Alberta Ferretti focused on sensuality in her spring 2010 collection (Menkes 2009). Making clothing that appeals to women in the hopes that it will also appeal to men is a way of incorporating sexuality into the fashion industry. Designers know that more often than not, a client is going to choose a more fashion forward and unique outfit than a safe one, and usually the unique outfit is going to incorporate sexuality in one way or another.
 * Designer Fashions and Runway Shows **

Every fall and spring, major cities around the world hold Fashion Week, a week where designers showcase their collections for the upcoming seasons. While some designers focus on ready to wear lines, many top designers present collections that most people would never wear in public. In these collections, sexuality is almost always incorporated. Often models are wearing little more than lingerie, and it is considered fashion by these top designers. Exposed undergarments, sheer fabrics, and leather are also often popular choices for designers like Dolce and Gabbana, and Alexander McQueen. Models in Alexander Wang’s spring 2010 ready to wear collection walked the runway in sheer dresses and bottoms that looked more like underwear than proper shorts. Many of the models had some kind of exposed undergarments. This is common among top fashion designers.

Even the performances from the models are becoming more sexual. In Chanel’s fall 2009 runway show at Paris Fashion Week, Karl Lagerfeld had three models in a ménage a trios scene at the end of the show (Blasberg 2010).

In the past, lingerie was something private that women kept to themselves and their significant others. In today’s society, there has been an explosion of lingerie lines that are marketing themselves just as normal clothing lines are doing. Three major lingerie companies, La Perla, Agent Provocateur, and Victoria’s Secret have become extremely successful selling lingerie to women around the world. All three companies have held fashion shows devoted to their merchandise, with the Victoria Secret Fashion Show being a nationally televised event in the United States since 2001 (Rhodes 2011). For lingerie companies to be having the same success as major fashion labels, this shows how big of a part sexuality is in society today.
 * Lingerie **

A major place where fashion and sexuality collide is in advertisements. For many major fashion labels, there has been a reliance on sexuality to sell their designs, rather than focusing on the quality of the clothing, among other things. More often than not, there is very little actual fashion going on in these ads. In the spring of 2011, an advertisement for the British retailer Jack Wills was forced to pull ads out of their spring catalog by the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA). There were complaints about the many partially nude models in the catalog (Retail Gazette 2011).
 * Fashion Advertisements **

The pages of magazines like //Vogue, Glamour,// and //Harper’s Bazaar// are littered with advertisements for designers like Louis Vuitton, Tom Ford, Gucci, and Dolce and Gabbana. More often than not, the models in the advertisement are scantily clad, or not wearing clothing at all with a focus on one item. In an advertisement for Tom Ford perfume, a woman holding a bottle of the perfume in front of her crotch is the entire advertisement. Sexuality is going to be continually used in fashion advertisements, since as society knows: sex sells.


 * References **

[Alexander Wang Spring 2010] [Photograph]. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://2.bp.blogspot.com/‌_8cSV9ve-_jY/‌TTSxeNhSs9I/‌AAAAAAAAAi4/‌7Msmz3sXAdM/‌s1600/‌Alexander+Wang+Spring+2010+-+3.jpg

Blasberg, D. (2010, January 12). The Sexification of Fashion. //Harper’s Bazaar//. Retrieved from http://www.harpersbazaar.com/‌fashion/‌fashion-articles/‌sexy-fashion-0210

// Jack Wills adverts banned due to ‘overt sexuality’ //. (n.d.). Retrieved from Retail Gazette website: http://www.retailgazette.co.uk/‌articles/‌03230-jack-wills-adverts-banned-due-to-overt-sexuality

Menkes, S. (n.d.). Sex -- the always reliable fashion inspiration. //The New York Times//. Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/‌2009/‌03/‌01/‌style/‌01iht-rsex.4.20512142.html

[1920s Flapper] [Photograph]. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.glogster.com/‌media/‌4/‌24/‌2/‌40/‌24024022.jpg

Rhodes, N. (2011). //Victoria’s Secret//. Retrieved from http://www.fashionencyclopedia.com/‌To-Vi/‌Victoria-s-Secret.html

// Seduction // [Online version of FIT Exhibition ]. (2009, June). Retrieved from The Museum at Fashion Institue of Technology website: http://www3.fitnyc.edu/‌museum/‌seduction/‌home.html

[Tom Ford Advertisment] [Advertisment ]. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://32fouettes.files.wordpress.com/‌2009/‌09/‌tomford.jpg