The shops might be full of gypsy looks, but what will your man think when you bring it home?
I REMEMBER shopping in London last summer, running in and out of shops, boutiques and department stores. It was all about silver high-heeled shoes and hot pink blouses sometimes phosphorus; an 80s style but without the really bad hair. Nearly a year later and I’m buying women’s magazines trying desperately to copy Sienna Miller’s style, who is widely known as the Boho queen (or princess if you are a Kate Moss fan). Out go the silver chains and printed blouses and in come long flowing skirts and necklaces of beads. It’s all about chiffon, bows, flowers and wedges. Shops are packed with gypsy clothes and the second-hand shops aren’t doing badly. But the most popular place to look is your mother and grandmother’s wardrobe; I found some small treasures that I won’t be throwing away. But even though I am enjoying myself, men don’t seem to be all that into this summer’s fashion, they hate it.
I was lying on the bed flipping through a well-known and trusted woman’s magazine, when my partner walked in. I decided to copy every single look in the magazine with clothes I had, to see which outfit he preferred. I was practically prancing around for two hours changing blouses, skirts, belts, shoes and every other little thingy I had in the wardrobe without getting 12 points for even trying. I didn’t get it, what was the problem? Well, apparently: “It’s not sexy!”
“I see women walking around in long skirts and baggy blouses and they just don’t get it,” said Marios Papaioannou, “they look like peasants!” Peasants? But could it be true?
The reason the Boho look is a flop with the blokes is the proportions and volume. From a man’s perspective (I’d like to highlight that), they really can’t understand why we would want to look like over-sized cakes. It appears they simply can’t comprehend the existence of something baggy on a woman. And that’s why we love it so much. It’s all been said a million times before: we don’t have a personal eyebrow consultant (!), we don’t have a personal stylist and we don’t have a personal trainer. There are days when we have a bloated tummy and feel like we could do a good imitation of Rosanne, so when something good like a loose-fitting skirt or top comes our way, we have no intention in letting it pass by.
As soon as we sense a change in the weather, we slip into a new wardrobe; that’s the way it goes and we aren’t exactly going to change that for anyone. Aren’t we still wearing skirts? “If you think those pieces of rags are skirts, you really don’t know fashion,” said Ioannis Michael, “although they might look good on a few women, they don’t suit everybody.” My partner couldn’t understand why I was having an argument with my mother about the fact that she threw all of her clothes away. Well, it’s simple: few women try desperately to wear clothes that can’t be found in shops down town, so what better way of looking chic than in a vintage piece? “It looks horrible and old fashioned,” said Stelios Papacharalambous, “it’s not sexy and you sometimes look ridiculous.”
True, I don’t look like Sienna and I definitely don’t look like Kate Moss but then again there are many celebrities who wouldn’t be seen dead, walking around in a gypsy skirt. I guess its just taste. “Women have to realise that not everything that is pushed into their face is good for them,” said Christos Theodorou, “just because it looks good on someone else, doesn’t mean that the same goes for them. And we don’t like Sienna Miller for her dress sense, we like her because she’s sexy.”
As with every trend that hits the catwalks and then the shops, the truth is, every woman goes crazy and thinks she is supposed to wear exactly that whether it suits her or not. And it most cases, unfortunately, it doesn’t. It’s kind of ridiculous, come to think of it, the way we silently follow in the footsteps of the giants who make clothes for goddesses who strut down the catwalk. But what do men know anyway? More importantly, what do they like? Girls who wear a simple vest (apparently that’s bigger than mini skirts), a pair of low cut jeans jazzed up by a pair of stiletto heels. I’m not even going to start on the espadrilles.
