Women in Trousers

Chanel and Yves Saint Laurent put ‘Women in Trousers’
When we pause to celebrate the successes of Yves Saint Laurent, we stumble upon the words “since Chanel” (Berge 1997, 7) time and time again. Yves Saint Laurent’s 1962 suit collection has endlessly been recognised as, “the best collection of suits since Chanel” (Mercury 2008). This comparison is supported by Valerie Steele, noted fashion historian, who boldly suggests that “more than any other designer since Chanel, Yves Saint Laurent represented Paris as the style leader” (Barker 2008). It is therefore undoubtable that Chanel and Yves Saint Laurent, through their designs, embody corresponding aesthetics that encourage such attributions of each other’s work to continue to be referenced in fashion history. This essay constructs an analytical contrast of both Chanel’s and Yves Saint Laurent’s interpretations of the androgynous aesthetic and how they align. Their portrayal of androgyny, more specifically “putting women into trousers” (Sischy 1998), inherently coincides with the social and cultural movements of the 1920s and 1970s; in specific reference to the role that the feminist movement of these eras played in inspiring the social statements made by these designers. An artistic breakdown of imagery will be utilised in this essay to compare the two designer’s personal, stylistic and social contributions through their designs.

Fashion, throughout history, has been perceived as a “social mirror reflecting the spirit of the times” and acting as a “motor for change” (Ruling 2000). Therefore, in order to deconstruct the similar aesthetics of Chanel and Yves Saint Laurent in terms of the physicality of the clothing they designed, the social constructs of the opposing eras must firstly be evaluated and understood. The twentieth century has nurtured significant advancements in the feminist movement. Consequently, fashion designers aesthetics have coincided with these eras that involved “first-wave feminism and second-wave feminism” (Echols 1989). Chanel was engulfed in the era of the 1920’s, when the first wave of feminism was “dealing with political and social inequality that restricted women in society” (Echols 1989). Chanel adopted this defiant persona and became a fashionable “motor for change” (Ruling 2000) by “flouting the rules of sartorial etiquette” (Steele 2005) and “putting women into trousers” (Sischy 1998). Known for her feminist approach to fashion, not only did Chanel’s designs encapsulate the ability to “escape rigid gender role stereotyping” (Entwistle 2000) but, through her revolutionary comfortable and masculine designs, she liberated women, giving them a feminine kind of power (Davies 2008). Similar to Chanel, Yves Saint Laurent “appropriated signs and symbols from the world around him, transformed them and integrated them into the creative process” (Berge 1997, 8). Thus when the second wave of feminism escalated in the 1970’s, up-rooting gender equality issues, Yves Saint Laurent responded creatively and gave women “a hidden cloak of neutrality that removed their sexuality and allowed them to compete more effectively in the male dominated workplace” (Kitchen-Smith 1998, 60). Both Chanel and Yves Saint Laurent responded to the feminist movements in their era’s and “deliberately reconfigured mainstream aesthetic codes and practices as a conduit to empowerment” (Tyner and Ogle 2009) in order to liberate women. They both redesigned femininity for women in the fashion arena by “mixing femininity with masculinity” through androgyny, “suggesting a new kind of fashion feminism” (Scott 2005).

Just as parallel social situations of the 1920’s and 1970’s inspired Chanel and Yves Saint Laurent to liberate the women of their time, their method of achieving such liberation bore a, suggestively, ‘identical’ avenue. Chanel and Yves Saint Laurent, in differing eras, both recognised the psychological empowerment that was associated with androgyny (Scott 2005) and liberated women by “putting women into trousers” (Sischy 1998). This idea of putting women into trousers ignited a form of androgyny, which is the combination of “both masculinity and femininity as traits of a unified gender that defies social roles and psychological attributes” according to Lee (2005).By exercising this avenue of fashion, Chanel gave women freedom and Yves Saint Laurent gave them power (Mercury 2008). But what did Chanel and Yves Saint Laurent actually give women fashionably?

“Chanel borrowed heavily from men’s closets, belting their jackets and sweaters and pairing them with skirts to make comfortable suits for working women. She pioneered trousers as eveningwear for women and invented clothing that would be worn during the day and into the night” (Wallach 1998).

“Yves saint Laurent pioneered the ‘power suit’ for women by taking menswear silhouettes and slimming them down to fit the female form. His legacy of pantsuits, blazers and tuxedos, borrowed from the traditional mans wardrobe has an undeniable feminine chic that women embraced” (Video Fashion 1998).

They were both working to liberate women through these androgynous designs; Chanel was on the forefront of social and political emancipation, whereas Yves Saint Laurent was liberating women in response to gender equality movements of the time. When a more broad examination is conducted, additional aesthetic alignment becomes evident, especially in terms of the style both Chanel and Yves Saint Laurent are notorious for. Yves Saint Laurent was referred to as “the boy prince of fashion” (Menkes 2006) who portrays a “sophisticated and classic style” (Video Fashion 1998). Which are two words that practically encapsulate the whole essence of Coco Chanel, as she had nobility thrust upon her and has come to be referenced as the “queen of fashion” (Silva-Jelly 2009). They have both been attributed with creating “classics that remain stylish decades later” (Ganley 2008).
The following two images of the represented garments are depictions of the androgynous aesthetic in two separate eras; the 1920’s and the 1970’s. The first image references how, in the 1920’s era, Coco Chanel endeavoured to incorporate comfort in the women’s wardrobe or, in essence, “freed women’s bodies from tight-lacing corsets and padding, restoring them to their natural state” (Baudot 2003, 9). The image is anchored by the relaxed ‘everyday life’ scenery to suggest that this outfit, incorporating a jersey “loose men’s trouser” (Fernandes 2009), knitted sweater, flat shoe and common pulled back hair style, is for the ordinary “everyday woman’s closet” (Fernandes 2009). The deep monotone colourings signify Chanel’s ostentatious reticence and penchant for minimalism (Baudot 2003, 7). It was through this aesthetic that Chanel liberated the women of her era from the previous fashionable, social and political constraints.

The second image signifies how Yves Saint Laurent put women into trousers and “evoked androgynous boyish charm” whilst retaining a “femme fatale” aesthetic. Tyner and Ogle suggest that “access to power, typically accorded to men, is acquired by invoking body-disciplining strategies to remake the feminine body into a likeness of a hard, angular, and muscular male physique” (2009, 108). This outfit design strives to achieve a more sophisticated, “professional” look, than that of Chanel, with the use of a structural and angular male silhouette in order to invoke this power that the feminist fashion theory embodies. However, Yves retains the element of femininity through stilettos and strategic cuts, “slimming the male silhouette down to fit the female form,” (News Weekly 2008) that accentuates the sexuality of a woman’s body. We have now jumped ahead fifty years where the androgynous aesthetic has shifted from a comfort icon, freeing women, to a status symbol, empowering women. Historically, the same social aspect of equality between genders is anchored in this image with the “women in trousers” (Kitchen-Smith 1998, 60) and their self-governing stance. The most influential and signature feature of this second photograph is the cigarette. This garment comes from the ‘Le Smoking’ collection that Yves Saint Laurent designed with the intent of giving women power, and “changing the way they saw themselves” (Bradbury 2005). This gesture of empowering women went hand in hand with the smoking (Bradbury 2005). “Yves Saint Laurent transformed woman into a queen who, in her smoking, dares to check the king” (Bradbury 2005). Thus, the designer was using an aesthetically pleasing route to represent the social and cultural construct of the time where women became leaders in the workplace. Ironically, Yves Saint Laurent and Chanel were practicing feminism by designing a male silhouette for women.

Just as similarities can be identified between Chanel and Yves Saint Laurent’s androgynous designs, differences are also evident. The obvious difference between these two images is in the fabrics used. Chanel constructed both the sweater and pants out of jersey fabrics as the liberation she was trying to achieve was that of comfort and freedom, as oppose to Yves Saint Laurent’s, being status and power. Yves Saint Laurent used more stiff fabrics to produce an angular framework to portray superiority, or in the least, equality. Where Chanel embodied her own aesthetic and “epitomized the liberated woman of the 1920’s” (Steele 1992, 122) by wearing her own designs, Yves had to understand the woman’s body from secondary perspective. One of the ways he understood “what women wanted” (Berge 1997) was through his muse, Catherine Deneuvre (Steele 2005, 119). “Chanel always dressed like the strong independent male she had dreamed of being” (Steele 1992, 119) whereas, Yves Saint Laurent had an innate understanding of “what women want before they knew themselves” (Video Fashion 1998) but also found his inspiration through his relationship with the successful Catherine Deneuvre.

This essay has explored the inspirations behind both Chanel and Yves Saint Laurent’s androgynous designs in the 1920’s and 1970’s. Chanel and Yves saint Laurent, although 50 years apart, were both responding to the social feminist movements of their times, in order to provide women with the liberation they needed. Both designers achieved such liberation through putting women into trousers and giving them a masculine physique whilst still respecting their femininity. The deconstruction of the images demonstrated the designer’s different interpretations of androgyny. However, through this, we identified their similar ability to adapt their designs to liberate the women of their era. Accordingly, Chanel and Yves Saint Laurent were both libertarians for fashion feminism who ironically accessed a masculine route to support the feminist movements and redesign what we know as fashion feminism today.

References
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