Column: Style toughens up

When it comes to fashion, it’s safe to say femininity rules supreme. From Valentino gowns to the ubiquitous Chanel bag, teetering Louboutin stilettos to Etro floral prints, womanly YSL suits to elegant Hermes leather goods.

It’s all made for the feminine, confident woman.

Fashion exists for countless reasons, but one of them is to flatter the figure.

For centuries, women have wanted to look their absolute best.

They wanted quality clothes that slimmed their waists and lengthened their legs. They chose perfect-fit pants and crisp shirts, body-skimming pencil skirts and ladylike pumps.

They wanted to look at the very least elegant, womanly and pretty. That’s how it’s been forever — until the ’90s rolled around.

It really wasn’t until that Kate Moss era of grunge and waifishness that women stopped dressing specifically to flatter themselves. Floor-length Martin Margiela skirts, beaten-to-shreds sneakers, zero makeup, pale skin and dangling cigarettes were all the rage.

Women weren’t trying to look elegant or pretty — they wanted to seem tough, carefree and rebellious.

Though Kate Moss remains one of the industry’s biggest influences, her sad, grungy waif look has since retired. Many women, however, have held onto that defiant streak. We’re obsessed with oversized clothes, piled-on jewelry, combat boots and bed-head hair. We’ve updated that ‘90s tough girl – she’s just a touch more glamorous, and a lot more hygienic.

Even self-proclaimed girly girls like me are wearing thick-soled Doc Martens, spiky bracelets, heavy chains and sack-like tops.

What seemed like a ’90s fad is simply evolving and adjusting as new trends, ideas and styles simultaneously emerge season after season.

For example, instead of going all-out grunge à la Courtney Love, girls today pair punky accessories with soft dresses, or clunky boots with floral tanks.
 
It’s that sense of juxtaposition — clever mixing and matching — that captures today’s modern tough-girl spirit.

Perhaps we’re simply noncommittal, hesitant to adhere to one specific trend. Or maybe we’re after that effortless “what, this old thing?” way of dressing. We take painstaking measures to appear simply “thrown together” while our ensembles are anything but.

Whatever it is we’re doing these days, it seems to be working. The new tough girl is here to stay.

We’re seeing her in this season’s leather pants, bustier-inspired tops and shredded Acne jeans, but even more in the covetable accessories: Gucci heels with shark tooth details, Alaïa lace-up heels, industrial Mr. Kate ear cuffs.

 It may not be ultra-feminine, nor is it flattering, but it definitely makes a statement.
 
­— emfarra@indiana.edu