Sorted. We’ve clicked and flicked through terabytes of frocky lookbooks, dear reader, through maga-zeeeens and all sources vital to the studious and intuitive fashion forecaster. A nice lie down is in order. But, before we retire, here, for your entertainment and education, is our quikstix-six-pack of Right Now markers for 2015.
(Main picture, top: From the current range by Jane Goldsmith, founder of They’ll Never Find Us. Photo, Brett Goldsmith.)
DAGGER TOE HEELS
The platform persists, but the elegant dagger-toed pump will step daintily beside it for all of 2015. In the same manner as calf-grazer hemlines, the dagger-toe high (or kitten) heel’s inherent glamour and trick of flattering the ankles, “slimming” the feet, will seduce the sceptics so thoroughly they will appear quite silly by December, wobbling and swaying like sea-legged sailors in their brick-high clodhoppers.
The dagger toe of 2014/2015 by Maison Valentino
BELOW-KNEE, CALF AND ANKLE-GRAZER HEMLINES
Will it never end, this blanket devotion among girls and women to knicker-flasher micro hemlines? Short skirts are well suited to the lithe, but borderline ghastly on the heavy-of-leg and wide-of-bottom. (ie: most of us). Nevertheless, like side cleavage (as attractive as testicle cleavage), their grip among core fashion trends has barely loosened in a decade. 2015, however; now here is a promising year. Below-the-knee, calf and ankle grazer hemlines have pecked along fashion’s fringe for all of four seasons. The time has come for knicker-flasher lovers to recognise the flattering potential of, for example, the calf-grazer hemline for its cunning way of revealing a girl’s legs at their narrowest point and optically “slimming” the ankles.
Below-the-knee wrap dress from the Sacha Drake winter 2015 collection suggests glamour rises as hemlines fall.
SLEEVELESS VESTS, GILETS, AND CAPE-LIKE THINGS
Well, duh. Cape-like things have enjoyed elite/cult status among fashionistocrats for the requisite four seasons so far; explosion into 2015’s mainstream is underway. Expect cape-like street, work, after-eight and even apres-active outerlayers, with an even split between silhouettes that sit neat and stiff and those (the Voxfrockers’ preference, natch) capable of flapping glamourously in a girl’s wake. The revival of sleeveless vests or gilets is an evolution of the cape’s outerlayer logic. Don’t ask the Voxfrockers precisely how they’re related; they just are.
Sleeveless vest from the Oskar winter collection.
YOGA FASHION KIT
Also known as activewear, gymwear and irritate-purists-who-still-think-a-girl-should-change-out-of-her-sweaty-pants-and-brassiere-after-exercise-wear. In 2015, self-respecting fashionisocrats simply cannot compose an off-day yoga, stepclass or run kit from a hotch-potch of Target basics and least-stinky stretchy bits from her laundry basket. Fashionable activewear will consolidate in the mainstream in 2015, helped by recent eruptions of new Australian brands (Vie Active, They’ll Never Find Us et. al.), expanded love affairs with old ones (Lululemon, Lorna Jane, et. al.), and commitment by retailers both on and off-line (Net-a-porter’s launch of Net-a-sporter et. al.) to rackspace, sitespace and developing the genre.
Vie Active’s Rockell “Midnight garden” design elite compression exercise tights,
LATEX, LEATHER, LUREX, VINYL, PLASTIC
Sounds tantalisingly erotic but the slow rise and rise of fleshy, sculptable materials in fashion is simply the logical on-trend of a decade of that marvellously stiff stuff, neoprene. Any stuff capable of being artfully sculpted is beloved of designers; any fabric capable of skimming a girl and “drawing” a new silhouette beyond her imperfect skin, is beloved of fashionistocrats.
Leather everything from the Daniel Avakian winter collection.
WIDE-LEG TROUSERS
Yes. The butt-hugging glute-lifting Lycra-legging (see “Yogawear”, above) phenomenon and denim skinny-grip jean will undoubtedly persist until hell freezes, but the wide-legged flag, flare and patio trousers will be appreciated for all their elegant plus-points (“slims” the waist, “elongates” the legs, particularly worn with partially concealed heels, has a satisfying slip and slap of fabric volume as you walk that is less self conscious, more glamourous, than tight-ass pants) in 2015.
Amen.
Wideleg trousers from B.C.The Label winter collection.
Compiled by Terry Carruthers, info@voxfrock.com.au, Emily Carruthers-Morgan, Michaela Summers and Candice Burke, intern@voxfrock.com.au, with Janice Breen Burns, editor, jbb@voxfrock.com.au
