Androgyny, a love affair
Adoring Self Expression and Sexual Tension
Gender norms of what looks masculine and what’s feminine became a standard for our culture long ago. It was a black and white world – either masculine or feminine apparel was offered by the fashion industry. There have always been a few remarkable exceptions like Marlene Dietrich in men’s suits and women in tuxedos in Helmet Newton’s once-thought-of-as-notorious imagery that created sexual tension with androgyny. That’s the point, isn’t it? Sexual tension is a big part of an androgynous look and sexual tension is the blood of the fashion industry. Sometimes, it can feel like vampires searching for their next feeding. Yet, the fashion industry deserves great credit for its recent breakthroughs in the transformation of fashion and culture. We also know that they will always be looking for the next big turn-on, whatever it is. Right now, it is androgyny and we love it.
The masculine/feminine worlds of fashion had created an overall repression to be self-expressive. Not any more. Fashion is leading the way by shining a very positive light on uni-sex self-expression and retaliating against other cultural norms. Fashion brands and designers are celebrating androgyny and encouraging individuals to be their true, authentic selves. There is an incredible surge of brands and models running over our culture’s previous obstacles.
We have watched models like Stella Tennant stand alone for years and adored her androgynous British schoolboy looks. Grace Jones was a shocker, a groundbreaker and so ahead of her time. Years ago, a very good friend of mine, a boy genius and head of marketing for Gap, decided on a whim during a fashion shoot prep in Central Park to switch the men’s and women’s wardrobes. The men looked dope in tight girl’s jeans and tight tops and the girls looked sexy in modified men’s khakis and shirts. The result was an androgynous masterpiece of sorts. However, it didn’t fly too well back at Gap’s corporate headquarters in San Francisco. At the time, the fashion industry was still circling androgyny and not allowed or brave enough to dive in. Not so today. Today, we have Cara Delevingne, Lucky Blue Smith, Kristen Stewart, Nico Tortorella, Timothee Chalamet and Erika Linder model in both men’s and women’s runway shows. There is a new wave of transformed men and women models who are exquisite and embraced by the fashion community. (We covered that story last week.) We are in an amazingly androgynous time. We have put together a photo gallery of a brief history of androgyny for you. We hope there are no more masculine and feminine lines, just people expressing their true selves. The definition of androgyny, according to the Oxford Dictionary, is “having both male and female characteristics.” Maybe we are entering a world of fashion and culture where definitions disappear. Wouldn’t that be lovely?
