Fashion Goes Far and Wide

What goes around comes around — again

By deBoRA h sA lomon

in shock. That woman is wearing bellbottoms! But wait. Not only are the bottoms flared. The whole leg has been widened!

Are those pants . . . or pontoons?

About once every decade I need to unload on fashion. You might think that with the world in such rough shape people wouldn’t care what they wear. Then, again, maybe during hard times fashion provides a diversion — anything to get the mind off The Indictment, Meghan & Harry, Ukraine and graham crackers at $2 a box.

But we mustn’t knock a multi-billion-dollar industry (employing hundreds of thousands) too hard, even though obsolescence keeps it alive.

Nothing works like what’s happening now: Return of the bellbottoms, even more revolutionary since pants have become the default for women.

This happened gradually, as I recall. What used to be called “slacks” and “dungarees” became pants and jeans. But a businesswoman in pants? Impossible! So the designers added a matching jacket, creating a pantsuit, worn with a girly blouse . . . er, top.

Women liked this, especially the tall, long-legged ones.

This popular trend for women survived the gender divide. Men adopted flares in casual pants and “leisure suits.” I can practically date a movie by its pants, especially the high-waisted, wide-leg ones that became Katharine Hepburn’s trademark.

The ladies soon learned that pants/pantsuits were practical, comfortable, versatile. Pantyhose wasn’t required, nor were shoes as important. The same pants could bottom a multitude of tops. Denim came out of the closet and into the spotlight — dress jeans, they were called, the quintessential oxymoron.

I’ve felt a change looming for several seasons, like elephants sense a tsunami and run for the hills. It began with gauzy wideleg “palazzo” pants — OK if you’ve got a palazzo in Tuscany, not

OK for the height-challenged, who seemed to sink into their volume. Then, this spring, fashion-forward TV anchorettes debuted pants that began flaring at the knee, got wider as they approached the ankle, then swallowed the foot like a whale swallows a school of fish. To further exacerbate the situation, CNN made them stand instead of hiding their pant legs under a desk.

Despite fostering flares the ladies retained the hairstyle best achieved when a power outage happens during a blow-dry. Or locks get caught in a woodchipper.

Remember that scene from Fargo?

Now I’m seeing baggy pants previewed in fall merchandise. More fabric means higher prices. My prediction: DOA, unless John Travolta exhumes “Stayin’ Alive” for his fellow senior citizens.

As for the guys, my shock turned to giggles watching them strut skinny suit pants, usually dark colors, paired with brownishorange shoes which elongate, not minimize, big feet. What do you call a male fashionista? Fashionisti? Sorry, guys, but nothing looks better than a classic well-tailored suit, a fine shirt, maybe oxford-cloth, in the proper neck size (no gaps), with a paisley tie.

My last arrow is aimed at women’s shoe designers who lag behind the pantspeople. Boo-hoo, Jimmy Choo. Skinny stilettos don’t marry well with wide-leg bell-bottoms. They require slightly chunky footwear, with stacked heels, don’t you agree?

Agree or not, I’m betting that by December stovepipe pants will look as dated as penny loafers and pleated skirts.

Fashion is a complex element of civilization. Think of the ancient Egyptians, the Romans, the Elizabethans. Chinese women wore pants while colonists still sported bustles and hoop skirts. These days, Kate Middleton and Meghan Markle call the shots. Because if clothes really do make a man, imagine their power over poor women like us. PS