Women love wearing black because:
It makes us look slimmer and taller.
It goes with everything
It hides dirt.
It goes from day to night; suburb to city.
It is chic and sophisticated, dramatic and mysterious.
It’s the color of mourning, but also of power.
After several seasons of vibrant colors, black is back. Many women are happy to see it, for reasons both practical and fanciful.
“It’s brilliant for travel, because you can take three or four pieces in black, add one or two colors, and you’re set,” says Melissa Sones, a New Yorker and author of “Full Frontal Fashion: Never Worry Again About What to Wear,” (Plume Book, $18), a compilation of advice from the contributors to the Women’s Entertainment Network television series.
“Black is also great for career dressing. There’s less time involved in deciding what to wear each day,” Sones says.
And it has presence.
“It’s a very protective color, like armor,” Sones adds. “I used to wear all black for years. A friend called me the Ninja Warrior. But I’d be sitting in restaurants, looking out the window and seeing a lot of other warriors too. Black is strong and protective.”
But it’s not for everyone, cautions Clinton Kelly, host of TLC’s “What Not to Wear” and co-author with Stacy London of “Dress Your Best: The Complete Guide to Finding the Style That’s Right for Your Body” (Three Rivers Press, $18.95).
“Black can be slimming, but if it doesn’t fit well, it’s as unflattering as any print or color in the rainbow,” Kelly says. “You have to pay attention to your body shape.”
And the color can look harsh, particularly on those with pale skin, he adds. “Especially in the fall and winter months, you can look washed out. And if you’re wearing it head to toe in the daytime, you can look like you’re going to a funeral.”
Black has long been associated with bohemian, beatnik, artsy culture; with motorcycle gangs and rock musicians.
Creative fashion types also have had an enduring love affair with black. As author Alison Lurie recalled in “The Language of Clothes,” designer Claire McCardell in 1943 paired a black sweater and tights with a dirndl skirt. A variation on the dancer’s look of black leotard, ballet shoes and dance skirt, the outfit “appears to indicate a sensitive, serious outlook on life and a consuming devotion to one’s art,” according to Lurie.
The downtown crowd liked wearing black in coffeehouses, while the uptown ladies, as epitomized by Audrey Hepburn in “Breakfast at Tiffany’s” (1961), liked donning little black dresses to attend cocktail parties.
Black came into fashion in a big way in the 1980s with the rise of such avant-garde Japanese designers as Yohji Yamamoto, and Rei Kawakubo for Comme des Garcon. While their designs, often in voluminous and asymmetric silhouettes, weren’t mainstream, the taste for black became widespread.
Such quintessential New York designers as Donna Karan long ago made black a signature and the “seven easy pieces” she introduced 20 years ago were all in black. Her fall collection of suits and draped dresses is again heavy with black, and accented with “cement” and “gunmetal,” other colors of urban life.
By the 1990s, black merged with minimalism and a taste for the simple, unadorned suit done by the likes of Miuccia Prada, Jil Sander and Helmut Lang took hold. The problem after a while was that it all looked alike and you couldn’t tell the $1,000 suit from the $100 version.
As the century turned, a casual, sporty aesthetic swept the country, along with an appreciation for vintage style, colorful printed fabrics and dressy outfits. Black hit the back burner.
Now it’s back, but with a difference, Sones says.
“Style has changed; it’s not as minimal as it used to be in the 1990s, when Calvin Klein and Donna Karan were doing it. There’s a lot more embellishment, more textured fabrics and layering. The designs are more involved. Instead of a black pencil skirt for the office, it might have a flare or asymmetric hemline.”
Ribbon and velvet trims, chiffon inserts on tweed, jeweled buttons and passementerie are giving a more opulent edge to suits. Fabrics tend to textures like tweeds, boucles and houndstooth checks rather than flat crepes or gabardines.
“It’s looking very sophisticated and ladylike,” says Nancy Sagar, spokeswoman for Neiman Marcus. “It never goes away all together, but there’s something about the simplicity of it that seems to be right. ”
Staff writer Suzanne S. Brown can be reached at 303-820-1697 or sbrown@denverpost.com.
Made in this shade
Leah Feldon, author of “Does This Make Me Look Fat?,” admits to being a “dyed-in-the-wool blackaholic” because it’s fast, easy and comfortable to wear. “I open a closet full of black stuff, pull something out, everything goes with everything else, I don’t look fat. It’s heaven,” she writes. Here are her tips for perking up basic black:
ADD TEXTURE with blouses, scarves and shawls.
Try sheers, crepe, silk charmeuse, velvet and chiffon.
ADD SPARKLE with jewelry. Silver, gold, pearls, diamonds, even minerals like jade and carnelian, work with black.
DON’T BE AFRAID to mix black with navy and brown.
WEAR YOUR FAVORITE COLORS around your face.
FOR ACCENTS, try cream or ivory instead of white for a more sophisticated look.
WEAR IT WITH CARE
Black isn’t the miracle fashion pill for every wardrobe, says Clinton Kelly, host of TLC’s “What Not to Wear” and co-author with Stacy London of “Dress Your Best: The Complete Guide to Finding the Style That’s Right for Your Body.” Here’s his advice:
PAY ATTENTION TO YOUR BODY SHAPE, because black will draw as much attention as any other color if it clings or droops in the wrong places.
TOO MUCH BLACK FOR DAY can look harsh, especially on those with pale skin.
WEAR METALLIC ACCESSORIES to relieve an all-black outfit.
ADD SOME SASS with jewelry and interesting silhouettes in black to put your own personality into the outfit.
