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Some fashions are like zombies: they just refuse to die. In all good horror films, the zombie will be shot down, battered over the head, and buried six feet under. Then it rises from the dead, ready to make you the next victim.
The runways in Europe and many of our local designers are featuring something back from the grave. No, not a zombie, but models in lace. Lace? The ultimate in fuddy-duddy, "wouldn't be seen dead in", fabric. But it's back with a vengeance, thanks to its ability to look sophisticated and feminine, and when black, give a soft gothic edge which is all the rage.
Lace was favoured as the edging on Laura Ashley-style flowery dresses in the eighties; was kicked out of the way by power dressing; reinvented by Madonna; and refused to be pigeon-holed as a wedding-dress material/goth staple/granny favourite. Lace. It's resilient. It's back (again).
It will not disappear, says Jo Ellison, features editor at British Vogue, so get used to it. "Lace will never die because its uses are so multifarious," she says. "It's an incredibly versatile fabric. It can look punky, powerful, profane or poetic, depending on how you wear it." And wear it we will, because designer powerhouse Miuccia Prada has decreed it the fabric of the moment.
Lace, however, is not the only "never again" style that's back.
Leather trousers are all the rage after years in the fashion wilderness, and bootcuts are back - to the delight of women for whom skinny jeans were impossible. Some "new" trends have barely been away - leggings have been poking out under dresses for about two years now - and some were never that fashionable in the first place. Pashminas were a Sloane Ranger staple long before, and after, their moment in the fashion limelight. Is this just fashion's circle turning? Or is the global credit crunch allowing us to dig out style from the back of the wardrobe?
For those old enough to remember leather and lace from last time around (or the time before that), it's time to welcome them back.
Pashminas
Rarely will you see a Sloane Ranger (or a political wife) without her "poshmina". This, despite Vogue saying in 1999 that they were over. "A pashmina is not fashionable," agrees Stefan Lindemann of Grazia. "It's a staple. But a Sloane pashmina has fringes. A cashmere wrap does not. And keep the colours neutral."
Leggings
Looking back at 80s photographs of Princess Diana it's easy to laugh. But Emma Jones of Missoni - which has reintroduced leggings for this season - says: "They've become a staple. Because leggings cut off at the ankle, the thinnest part, that's very flattering for the leg."
Leather
Apparently, Blake Lively, hottest US actress of the moment, will be wearing leather trousers in the next series of Gossip Girl, which means all sorts of women will be wearing them soon too. Designers have always liked leather, says Sarah Harris, fashion features writer at Vogue, "though they definitely went through a bad patch in the eighties and early nineties; they were hard, crunchy and terribly uncomfortable, but Chanel and Versace adored them because they empowered.
"Think liquorice legs," says Harris. "They have to be spray-on tight and you have to be reed thin."
* Stockists:
Annah Stretton 09 360 0062, Carlson 09 361 2137, Hailwood 09 360 9931, Kate Sylvester 09 524 8872, Myhart 09 309 6180, Sabine 09 529 0142
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