Man in a dress!

[DALederle]

Found on the web a pic from some un-named fashion show of a man in a dress. A dress made for a man.
What does the CAFE think of this concept. I have felt for a long time that a dress is perhaps the most perfect kind of garment to wear. It can be made with pockets and it hangs from the shoulders in a way that gives maxium freedom between our legs. And yet can be made cover as much as it needs too.

man in a dress.jpg

Dennis A. Lederle

[crfriend]

Found on the web a pic from some un-named fashion show of a man in a dress. A dress made for a man.

What does the CAFE think of this concept.

There are a few members of the SkirtCafe community who are actively experimenting with dresses in a masculine context. It's a mode of dress (sorry for the pun) that shows great promise for guys, but requires care in how one presents; since virtually all dress-styled garments are specifically tailored to womens' shapes and "characteristics" there are tremendous pitfalls in adopting them directly the way it's possible to do with many skirts. The problem with most "designed-for-,men" dress styles is that they seem to "go overboard" trying to be "masculine", and that causes problems if its own.

Certainly the caftan shows huge promise, as do various forms of robes -- in fact one of the folks who occasionally stops by to see what's up at the Cafe got married in a robe. Sapphire constructed a robe-like garment for me back in the 1990s, and we're trying to find it -- the odds are very good that it'll either fit perfectly or be a wee bit too large.

[stefan]

I think the dress is a perfect garment. We should not restitrict ourselves to just wearing skirts. We should also wear dresses. But of course for most guys our bodys does not automatically fit into female dresses.

/Stefan

[Sylvain]

Still looks female to me: tight above the waist, loose below, almost touching the ground, like a bride's dress...

[stefan]

Hi,

Here is an example of a Swedish artist called Thomas Di Leva that always is dressed in a caftan. He varies the colours etc a lot.

dileva.jpg

[DALederle]

Personally, in just my oppinion, over the years I have noticed that fashion designers who do try to design skirts or dresses to worn by men seem to get the designs wrong.
I can't put my finger on exactly how they do that except that the designs come out either too feminine for the male figure or too masculine for the type of garment.
I would favor a shirt waisted design. The top looking like a normal mans Vee neck shirt with pockets on the chest. The lower skirt either a A-line or full skirt style, of moderate length, knee length to midi. The skirt portion should also have pocket front and back, so a man would not have to carry a purse.
I know a lot of men, now, wear fanny packs, especially in the summer time, with their casual shorts but I think pockets as I mentioned would help put the concept of a dress over for some men, at least.
Like anything else, it's not for everyone!
But I like the idea!
Dennis A. Lederle

[imadube]

I found a perfect fitting what I see as a unisex dress - called a cover up. Works great for lounge wear, sleep shirt or a dress.
Picked one up a wally world and is great. Much better then the baggy look and feel of a over sized t-shirt.
Cheap too.
Here is a net link to one just like it (actually cheaper then wally worlds too)
http://www.chadwicks.com/Search/SearchR ... over%20ups

[Since1982]

I think the dress is a perfect garment. We should not restitrict ourselves to just wearing skirts.

2 things. 1. I'd like to get men accepted wearing skirts as a regular garment before jumping into too much dresses etc. We are just starting to get the idea around that we are NOT trying to look like women but that a skirt is a healthful garment for men's plumbing AND it's being accepted in many circles.

2.I have the notion that if we all start dressing like that picture you posted of the guy in the "dress"/caftan with the lipstick and coiffed hairdo we are going to do damage to acceptance of skirts for men being a viable choice. The public will just go back to their former idea that any man in a skirt is a tranny, which we've done a lot to get away from.

[crfriend]

1. I'd like to get men accepted wearing skirts as a regular garment before jumping into too much dresses etc.

I see no intrinsic harm in pursuing parallel paths so long as the wearer of the garment isn't role-playing or otherwise pretending to be something he isn't. I think that good designs can be done for men's dresses, but that they will -- of necessity -- be very different from women's styles. Whilst many of us can "appropriate" skirts from the "other side of the aisle", the same will most assuredly not hold true for dresses.

2.I have the notion that if we all start dressing like that picture you posted of the guy in the "dress"/caftan with the lipstick and coiffed hairdo we are going to do damage to acceptance of skirts for men being a viable choice.

Once again, it all comes back to context. I forget the chap's name, and I cannot locate for the life of me his imagery, but he posted a shot of himself in a caftan that made him look like he just came off the Asian steppes along with Ghengis Khan's boys -- and I'd posit that one would not call those blokes "girly" in the least!

Now, speaking directly to the image above in this thread, I'd have to make a call of androgeny on that one -- and I do not represent that as a bad thing so long as other subtle cues exist to inform the observer of the truth. That being said, most fashion models today are remarkably androgenous, and sometimes deprived of proper context, it'd be understandable that a casual observer might not be able to determine at a glance the sex of the model in question -- and that's, I suspect, what may put lots of folks off about skirted rigs -- including dresses -- on guys.

[Grok]

Views of Jennifer Minniti.

[crfriend]

Views of Jennifer Minniti.

There are a lot of good catch-phrases in that article, and the author had a lot of good points, but this line at the bottom discouraged me somewhat: "From the March 1998 issue of the Metropolitan." -- that's eleven years elapsed and not one bit of motion to be seen. Even glaciers move faster than that.