Tuesday, March 08, 2005

Layerin' my arms

What a dreadful pun that was, even by my exacting standards. Anyway, I was looking at pictures from Paris Fashion Week, and was intrigued by this look from Collette Dinnigan:


(Picture: Herald Sun)

It looks a little too silly to be worn as a street look, but the sculptural forms are really beautiful - the way it bunches on the upper arm and then softly bells out before being caught up at the wrist. It's interesting the way that a retro-looking design is being worn in this very irreverent, casual way. It sort of brings to mind the grunge layering look, where you'll wear a t-shirt over a long-sleeved top. But it manages to look quite neat and dressed up.

Marc Jacobs had a similar design for Louis Vuitton, only his was a jacket with puffed elbow-length sleeves worn over a long-sleeved top. Sometimes you see this look on the street when someone is wearing a vintage 3/4-sleeve coat with long sleeves underneath. Also, you sometimes see girls wearing detachable thick sleeves over t-shirts or with sleeveless tops. I used to do this look by wearing legwarmers on my arms. It was surprisingly warm in winter.

I predict that we might see more sleeve layering over the next year - whether with long gloves, detachable sleeves or short-sleeved garments worn over long-sleeved ones.

1 comment:

Mel said...

The other day I noticed another example of this tailoring/layering/casual look in the window of Feathers in Australia On Collins. The mannequin was wearing a black and white spotted blouse with a high frilled collar under a black t-shirt.

Now I have noticed plenty of women layering shirts with singlet tops, particularly Bonds singlets. I did it myself all last year. But the t-shirt is a new thing. I liked the way the t-shirt sleeves gave way to the long, soft blouse sleeves.