Leading Strings ~ Marlies Dekkers

The NY Spring 18 Lingerie Market is imminent. We are currently enmeshed in industry trade shows:  Mode City, Miami Swim, Curve just to name a few. I go to the shows with great expectations. Are there any creative product ideas with real potential momentum? Usually they emerge from entrepreneurial visionaries: women like Marlies Dekkers. Some years ago, Marlies brought strappy lingerie to the mainstream, by taking a then radical design idea and refining it. She elevated the use of straps from a bondage statement to a new perspective: feminine liberation. Using subtlety to deliver the message, her brand became synonymous with tasteful everyday sensuality.  The Dame de Paris bra was a priority piece (still is) in shop inventories that needed fashionable styles that actually sold. And, like any product that hits a retail nerve, this concept, which birthed a fashion trend, was exploited ferociously. I know that strappy lingerie is now part of the intimates design lexicon, but frankly, I think it’s been pushed to the edge.

I still believe that the original concept, brought to the forefront by Marlies Dekkers, remains first in class; but I am a bit tired of all the wanna-bes.  When I saw Marlie’s newest iteration, Leading Strings, I realized that her original design still had staying power. The increased height of the signature straps as well as the wider shoulder straps add additional lift fitting 32-40, B-F cups.  This expands its appeal to a larger group of women remaining daring yet understated. The difference here is that these pieces, in everyday black and summer white are sophisticated styles that do not distract but rather “frame your beauty”.

“I Love Women Who Give Convention the Middle Finger,
Especially When They Do So In a Creative, Elegant Way” ~Mira Nair