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Lingerie Girdles Cachet With The Fashion-Savvy

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By RUTH LA FERLA, The New York Times

Published: October 28, 2007

Poor Miss Lucarelli. Our sixth-grade English teacher became the inadvertent object of our mirth the day we caught her tugging at a corset strap that had strayed from the sleeve of her shirt. More shaming than dandruff, that risque glimpse of underwear made us giggle till we hurt.

Today it would scarcely rate a glance, that sort of exposure having lost its taint back in the day when Madonna was a girl. In fact, if Miss Lucarelli deliberately wore her corset outside her shirt, it would establish her as a paragon of hip, a role model for the throngs of women who buy lingerie for shaping, comfort and, increasingly, for show.

Lingerie items have become 'display pieces,' said Stephanie Solomon, fashion director of Bloomingdale's.

Corsets, slips, panties and camisoles are as extravagant in their design, and as coveted, as Louboutin platforms or a YSL tote.

Lingerie's cachet as a sexy, emphatically visible component of a woman's outfit has contributed to rising sales. According to NPD Group, a market research firm, sales of bras, panties, slips, corsets and even old-school relics such as garter belts, climbed to $10.6 billion for the 12-month period ending in July, a 10 percent jump over the previous 12 months.

Clearly, the category known quaintly as intimate apparel has climbed to the top of women's shopping lists.

'What is really driving the growth of the business,' said Marshal Cohen, the chief retail analyst of NPD, 'is that showing off your lingerie has become very much a fashion trend.'

To women of all ages, visible skivvies are all but scandalproof.

'Showing your intimate apparel today is socially acceptable in most generations,' Cohen said. The assertion is supported by an NPD survey last spring in which 77 percent of respondents, women of varying ages, said they were comfortable revealing bits of their underwear.

Pushing lingerie into a more public role are design and construction that are all but indistinguishable from swimwear or even evening wear. Choosing lingerie 'is about what makes you look good, but also what looks good with or through your clothing,' said Monica Mitro, a spokeswoman for Victoria's Secret, the brand that catapulted racy flimsies into the public eye. 'People are taking the bold step to actually incorporate underwear as part of their outfit.'

Such a notion may have been subversive in the heyday of new wave acts such as Blondie, Cyndi Lauper and the youthful Madonna, 'when bras suddenly became sportswear,' said David Wolfe, creative director of the Doneger Group, which forecasts fashion and retail trends.

Today the concept has gone mainstream, Wolfe added, confiding that he was nonetheless taken aback during a recent visit to the Mall of America outside Minneapolis at the sight of dozens of women, young and not-so-young, sunning themselves poolside at his hotel, wearing Victoria's Secret molded bras.

Their apparent nonchalance is the product of an onrush of imagery: television shows such as 'Desperate Housewives' and 'Dirt' that feature lissome matrons and dominatrix editors slinking about in camisoles; paparazzi snaps of Victoria Beckham in a fluorescent pink bra under a zebra-striped top; shots of Ashley Olsen in her fashion signature, a black bra under a thin white T-shirt.

In both instances, the layering of lingerie staples is as considered a gesture as matching one's pumps to one's bag. Olsen topped her own brazen performance in the October issue of Harper's Bazaar, displaying boy-cut satin briefs beneath a transparent party frock.

The trend to exposure, while originating on the streets of cities like Los Angeles and London, reached something of an apogee during the spring 2008 ready-to-wear shows. John Galliano paraded lace-edged nighties on his catwalk at Christian Dior. Stella McCartney showed a romper suit that combined what looked like a shrunken twin set with little-boy briefs.

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