Clothes: =STRIPES=

We Love Stripes!

Thick, thin, pinstripes, chevron, color blocked, ombré, vertical, horizontal, etc...There's something that can work on everyone.

Halfway through the 13th century, some Palestinian monks showed up in Paris wearing brown-and-white striped cloaks. This was not OK with the French, who only wanted white, no brown, and certainly no mixing. These other monks were nicknamed “the barred brothers,” and — though Pastoureau can’t totally prove it — that must be how prison stripes, meant to signify cell bars, were born.

Horizontal stripes weren’t just for monks, either, but various outcasts in medieval times: prostitutes, bohemians, clowns, ruffians, Jews, “the condemned” and hangmen.

Four centuries later, the French revolted, and stripes — now tri-colored, and a symbol of the new order — went vertical. In the 19th century, up-and-down bars belonged to the rich and fashionable, distinguishing them from the poor and the prisoners.

It was Coco Chanel, but of course, who changed everything. Legend has it she borrowed a blue-and-white, thinly striped sweater — the Breton, established in 1858 by the French navy — from her lover, tailored it to herself, et voila! It became the most timeless and tireless emblem of Gallic chic.

Prison stripes broke out further in the ’80s, first among the New Romantics and Vivienne Westwood’s pirate crew. Way later, they appeared as a mall-punk staple. In higher fashion, Hubert de Givenchy re-arranged the black-and-white bars to make brilliant geometry.

Indeed, the last available rebellion in stripe-wearing is to ignore the rules and mix them with abandon: with other stripes in other widths or directions, or with other patterns — like florals or plaids or polka-dots — or, sure, all the above.