071209 Patricia
McLaughlin/RealStyle
modesty
Reawakens
Religious and ethical convictions and aesthetic judgments
converge on clothes that decline to let it all hang out.
Adding a pair of “Sleevies”—stretchy separate ¾-length cotton/Lycra knit
sleeves, $10.50 for solid colors, $14 for tie-dye from
www.koshercasual.com —to a girl’s short-sleeved T-shirt provides
modest coverage while adding a pop of color.
Illustration: Patricia McLaughlin
O
ne evening several days before the 1963 high school prom at St. Mary’s
High School, all attendees were required to bring their prom dresses to
the convent for vetting by our principal, Mother Mary Cajetan. Everybody
knew up front that no strapless dress would be approved—not, anyway,
without added-on wide straps, improvised modesty panels and who knew
what all, so why bother? Necklines judged too low would be raised with
lace insertions. Spaghetti straps would be bulked up.
At the time, I have
to say, it seemed excessive: What sort of God would consign a girl to
eternal damnation because her prom dress shoulder straps were a
quarter-inch too narrow?
I’ve told this story
before as a quaint example of the repression teenage girls grew up with
before everything changed in the late 1960s tsunami of hippies, be-ins,
denim, protest, sex, drugs and rock’n’roll. So I’m as surprised as
anybody to find that modesty—a word missing from the fashion vocabulary
for the past half century—is once again a contender for the hearts,
minds and wardrobes of American women.
All along, there’s
been a countervailing undercurrent of parental resistance to fashions
that invite 12-year-old Emmas and Emilies and Taylors and Madisons to
dress like little Lolitas. (“Over my
dead body will you leave the house dressed like that, young lady!”)
Now, when you Google
“modest clothing,” you find earnest young women doing it for themselves.
No doubt the modesty
underground has been there all along to some extent. Now that, like
everything else, it’s online, it’s that much more visible. But I suspect
it’s more than that—and there sure is plenty of it out there, in about a
zillion variations.
There are, as you
might expect, online retailers who specialize in modest clothes for
Muslim women, Orthodox Jewish women, and women from Christian sects like
the Amish and some Mennonites that wear “plain” clothes, as well as
those, like the Mormon Church, that make a point of modest dress.
Some lean toward
classic, full, flowy clothes; others aim to be trendy.
www.FunkyFrum.com offers hoodies, long side-striped skirts made from
sweatshirt fleece, a slinky dress in a Pucciesque print—as well as a
“Runway Look Makeover” feature that tweaks and layers runway designs
from Missoni, Chanel, etc., for women who don’t wear miniskirts or
decolletage.
Israel-based
www.koshercasual.com advertises “modest camp clothing”—including
tie-dyed “sleevies” for girls, separate stretchy ¾-length sleeves to be
worn under short-sleeved T-shirts. They’re almost-but-not-quite exactly
the same thing as the trendy armwarmers from a couple of years ago—and
the site shows them mixed instead of matched: one pink, one green. Their
knit mini-shrug—not much more than a pair of long black t-shirt sleeves
joined across the back—also has interesting possibilities.
It’s striking how
ecumenical this new online world of modest dress seems. For instance,
www.modestclothing.com, which serves Orthodox Jewish women who cover
their hair and favor long sleeves and long skirts, posts a testimonial
from “a Roman Catholic mother of three children who is trying to follow
(largely-ignored) Church teachings regarding modesty and purity--but I
don't want to look ‘frumpy’ or like I live on the prairie!” Another
customer who is “learning more about my husband's Turkish heritage”
complains about “the fashions nowadays which make statements like ‘I'm a
child’ with clothes that seem too small or... reveal too much.”
Another kind of
ecumenism: Sites that help women find modest dress patterns are also
happy to direct costume designers and reenactors to sources of patterns
for period clothing.
The layouts from
Eliza, a fashion magazine
“created for women who want to be stylish, sexy, and engaged in the
world while retaining high standards…,” don’t look that different from
those in Elle or
Glamour. The models are
gorgeous, the clothes are pretty, the photography is lush. The magazine,
founded by former model Summer Bellessa, a member of the Mormon Church,
promises in its mission statement to stand apart from “a media culture
that frequently objectifies and commercializes women and their bodies”
and “emphasizes sex and skin in order to push products or sell
magazines.” It’s also committed to being “realistic about women's
bodies: We don't retouch bodies, and we mix real women and professional
models.”
There are blogs and
websites like
www.QuakerJane.com that track individual women’s experiences in
embracing plain, modest or religiously observant dress.
Interestingly, many
of the same styles that appeal to these women for religious or ethical
reasons an also attract women who want to dress in a way that’s
romantic, or retro, or just different. After last year’s raids on the
polygamous breakaway Mormon sect at the Yearning for Zion Ranch in
Texas, a story in the Jewish weekly The Forward described a young woman
with no connection to the Fundamentalist Latter Day Saints sect who was
nonetheless quite taken with “the dresses worn by the FLDS women and
girls…” She was “obsessed” with “that long-sleeved, high-neck, sober
ankle-grazing look.”
Maybe it’s not all
that surprising. Skin has been way overexposed. As Oscar de La Renta
told me once, hemlines can move in only two directions, and can only go
so far in each one: Once they go up as far as they can, they have to
come down.
And, after the long
(and not always that attractive) reign of low-rise jeans and cropped
t-shirts, who wants to look at another muffin top ever again? Modesty
looks wonderful by comparison.
And why not? For
years now fashion magazines have been urging readers to ignore
you-must-wear-this-now dictates. Instead, you’re supposed to dig down to
find an authentic personal style that expresses your true self. Clothes
that reflect a woman’s religious conviction or her particular—even
peculiar—aesthetic do exactly that. And it’s not as if you’re going to
look weird, not with half the world tromping around done up in Goth or
Ironic Prep or art-school black with fringe or Pee-wee Herman suits or
dizzying platform centurion sandals with five-inch heels.
Now that there are
no rules, there’s no downside to looking the way you think you should.
30
© 2009
Patricia McLaughlin
Every Sunday, RealStyle goes to 100 subscribing newspapers in the United
States and
Canada (combined circulation: 60 million) from Universal Press
Syndicate.
available for reprint: Patsy.McL@Verizon.net
