Moments of Mugler: For the Love of Latex

Before McQueen there was Mugler. Thierry Mugler, to be specific. French couturier Thierry Mugler died last week, but he left a dazzling legacy, having created some of the most spectacular fashions I’ve ever seen. As a youngster I was seduced by the work of Mugler, pictured above with Texan confection, supermodel Jerry Hall. I studied in awe the principles of haute couture as they unfolded so masterfully before my impressionable eyes on the great ‘Style With Elsa Klensch.’

Mugler, like McQueen, designed the most formidable of fashions, which paraded themselves down the catwalk on only the most magnificent of models. If you’ve never seen a runway show of Mugler’s, you are most certainly missing something! And just as McQueen’s death took fashion by beautiful storm, so too will Mugler’s. We are going to look at some of the great trend takeaways from this very sad loss of a style giant — a patron saint of the wickedly feminine and the beautifully bawdy — Mr. Thierry Mugler.

Trend Takeaway 1: For the Love of Latex

I saw something I liked very much at Paris Fashion Week in 2019 right as the pandemic hit a couple years ago. I didn’t see much of it. It’s a lateral move from leather. It’s latex. But I wanted to see more of it.

After the death of Thierry Mugler, I guarantee, you’re going to be seeing a lot of latex. It looks really modern and rocker to me right now. I mean, latex leggings are seriously the only thing cooler than leather leggings. I loved the look at Givenchy and Richard Quinn, and I love that it can be fashioned, quite fashionably, out of colors other than black. But Thierry Mugler really brought latex home in a big way, literally decades before the general public was ready for such a startling bit of naughtiness all the way back in 1988 with his dangerous She-Devils collection. His longing for latex punctuated an entire career, as evidenced in his Autumn Winter 1995 collection, shown below.

What I’d like to see is more latex and latex imaginatively-executed…in dresses, thigh-high boots, miniskirts or, better yet…catsuits! There’s something alluring about the head-to-toe glossiness of it all. The look is so feline and deliciously noir, as shown on the arresting Helena Christensen, below. The high-shine texture is a welcome change. Latex looks slightly off-center, but oddly, right on target to me now. With a mild dominatrix innuendo, it’s just a wee bit bondage……and you’re going to be seeing a lot of it, so thank Uncle Thierry for that!

More Moments of Mugler coming up. So stay tuned! We will examine the influences and the forthcoming trends that will be birthed after this legend’s death. RIP, Thierry Mugler.