During the showing of the spring Anne Klein collection in New York, a very curvy young model named Tyra wriggled her way down the runway in a black crocheted dress and caused an uproar. It wasn’t just Tyra’s figure or her smoldering sashay that ignited the crowd. That crocheted dress-in a very openwork pattern vaguely resembling posies and pineapples-tautly stretched over that tawny skin was just about the sexiest thing anyone in that audience had seen during a month’s worth of fashion showings. Outright nudity wouldn’t have been quite as provocative.
Only later did word leak out that beneath that crocheted dress was a bodysuit that perfectly matched Tyra’s skin. But the illusion of seeing through an openwork pattern was somewhat akin to reading between the lines; you got more-or you thought you got more-than what was really there.
There are probably a number of reasons so many designers used a great variety of openwork fabrics for spring, ranging from crochet and lace to mesh, macrame, eyelet, loose and webby knits and even some punched and patterned suedes and leathers.
For one thing, certain designers have been using nearly transparent chiffons and georgettes for the last several seasons and just might be wearying of them. Perhaps these openwork fabrics are their alternatives to sheers.
Then, too, many of these openwork materials add the welcome element of texture, yet, unlike burly tweeds and thick knits, they still maintain an airiness and lightness appropriate for warm-weather wear.
However, it’s that perception of eroticism that may very well be the prime reason that designers-male and female alike-showed so many peekaboo fabrics for spring and summer.
There’s a certain intrigue when such materials send out mixed messages. Lace and eyelet, for example, evoke thoughts of things old-fashioned and charming, feminine and even demure; the word crochet conjures memories of doilies and company-for-dinner-tableclothes. Some designers like to take these fabrics with the genteel reputations and whip them up in a way that provides the extra fillip of teasing: Is she or isn’t she wearing something under that little number?
However, other designers are far more straightforward and simply layer their openwork fabrics over clearly visible underpinnings. Valentino, for example, put his beaded mesh tunic and other such tops over bras; in both his Chloe collection and in his own Karl Lagerfeld collection, Lagerfeld also liked layering and showed, among other things, a spidery long black dress over a tank-topped mini, a white fishnet skirt over black tights; Jean Paul Gaultier superimposed skirts of lace over all sorts of garments, from bikini panties to wide-cut striped trousers.
Perhaps these particular designers are the leaders in a new trend toward things virtuous and chaste.
Or maybe they’ve simply decided to be politically correct.
