For the sake of menswear and the sake of our own eyes, will men stop wearing harnesses at events? As soon as possible? It really is a confusing accessory to rock on. Oh and, explain us what in the name of fashion is going on?
Some trends come and go. Some of them stay a bit longer than others. And some of them come back, decades after having been forgotten. But why? Why bringing back trends that we all know mean bad taste? Why harming ourselves like that? We’ve had our share of 70’s trends comebacks: the dad sneaker, fur and shearling coats (which are now quite debated for sustainability purposes, obviously), clogs, crochet clothes and more.
Look, I’m not saying that all those trends are ridiculous or hideous. I would just like to take a moment to talk about one of them that is between confusing and unique. I’m talking about the harness (or the embroidered bib, as some of us like to call it).
As far as we can go back, the harness seems to have appeared somewhere between the early 1970’s and the mid 1980’s. Vivienne Westwood used to sell harnesses to male customers, while Jean Paul Gaultier was putting it on women (Madonna on her Blonde Ambition tour for example). But let’s not forget one of the most mainstream moments for the harness: Mel Gibson wearing a holster-like garment in Mad Max 2: The Road Warrior.
After being slowly forgotten about, it appears that the harness is now back, and that a lot of men are wearing it on red carpet events (yes, women are also wearing harnesses, but why bother talking about women when, wow, it is so weird to see men with such an unusual accessory. Are men even allowed to wear accessories nowadays?).
It seems that the harness was first seen on the Olympic figure skater Adam Rippon at the Oscars ceremony in 2018 (he was wearing a leather bondage inspired harness underneath his suit and started a lot of conversations). In the same year, we also had Chadwick Boseman (ESPY Awards, wearing a white leather harness over a cream tuxedo) and the year 2019 blessed us with Timothée Chalamet (black leather and embroidered bib) and Michael B. Jordan (flowery leather harness); the first one at the Golden Globes while the second one rocked the accessory at the Screen Actors Guild Awards.
I realize that it must be difficult for everyone to follow me, since we are uncertain about the right word to use for this trend. Is it a harness? Is it a bib? Is it supposed to give a hint of BDSM? Of gun holster? Is it toddler reins for adults? For fashion’s sake, please let us know! Even the people who wear it don’t seem to be sure of what to call it. Timothée Chalamet told Ellen DeGeneres during an interview “I thought it was a bib. They told me it was a bib!”. They, referring to Louis Vuitton, since the house directed by Virgil Abloh is the culprit behind most of the harnesses that we could see on red carpets. The thing is, they are not even listed as harnesses (Chalamet’s one is referred to as an embroidered bib, whereas Jordan’s is called an embroidered mid-layer bib).
For the price of the accessory, you could make an effort and give it a final name, don’t you think? Because, yes, everything comes with a price. And this leathery item that allows an “accessomorphosis” – as Abloh called it himself, to describe the fusion of apparel and accessories -, costs a good £2000.
The real question here is, what do people think about this trend? When I asked people for their opinion, I got multiple answers, but they were all going in the same direction. “I find it a bit daring, not everyone can like it and I think it’s a bit provocative. Like, they want to break the ‘conventional’ fashion.” said Wissem Rachdane, a student in pharmacy. “It looks like a holster at first sight. But I don’t think that there really is any connotation behind it, except ‘I have money and this is Louis Vuitton leather that costs £3000’. There are two options, either people will get used to it and everyone will want one, or, everybody will forget about it since it’s really ugly.”
I could also hear “Bloody ridiculous”; “Unattractive, pointless”; “Good for your posture!”; “Is it a fitness thing?”; “Health and safety reasons only” and “A waste of resources”. Yes. It is a waste of resources. All those trends that come and go make us like or dislike something, generates opinions, but most of all, they generate manufacture, and sometimes for nothing. Because in this case, it is clear that people are not attracted by this leather harness, so please, listen to the people and the planet, and don’t produce useless quantities of an accessory that won’t sell.