Features
TheFashionRox for LOTL.com - September 2009 column TheFashionRox for LOTL.com - August 2009 column
Don't get me wrong, I love boobs. Just not my own.
Why is it that however much the sight of my girlfriend’s boobs turns me on, catching a glimpse of mine instantly makes me feel self-conscious and insecure? My G(inormous)-cup boobs have long been the bane of my existence. They give me chronic back pain (sexy, huh?) and act as man-magnets meaning sexual harassment in the street has been a regular occurrence since puberty. But I could cope with the cramps, I could handle the catcalls from complete strangers. It's what they stop me wearing that hurts the most. In the changing room my breasts are two unruly obstacles blocking my path to fashion glory. Outfits that look stylishly adorable on my flat-chested friend make me look like I'm applying for a job at Hooters. The number of garments I have had to cast aside due to the dreaded Comedy Cleavage is enough to make me weep into my undie drawer of thick-strapped boulder-holder bras.
A Brief Word On Brassieres
Underwear shopping is a nightmare when your boobs are bigger than your head and the only bras that fit are labeled Maternity. Nobody wants lumpy, bumpy boobs so I can’t stress enough the need for a correctly fitting bra. It’s a good idea to get professionally measured and to bear in mind that as with clothes you might be different sizes in different shops. The thing with big boobs is if you try and constrict them they end up looking like misshapen mounds of unwanted flesh. I find minimizer bras squash mine when I want them to be lovingly cradled. Instead I go for a well-fitting, full-cup T-shirt bra. Another essential if you want to wear low-cut tops or dresses is a non-padded, plunge front bra that will hold your boobs in place without pushing them together too much.
It is an ongoing struggle to find stylish bras in bigger sizes. There are a few in David Jones and Myer but if you’re after a greater selection check out www.bellaforma.com.au (stocks up to an L cup and the new D-G Elle Macpherson range), www.storminadcup.com.au (goes up to an L cup and does swimwear too), www.brastogo.com.au (the aptly named Big Girls Don't Cry Anymore does bras in sizes B to L), www.bravissimo.com (bras up to a JJ cup as well as a range of clothing specially designed for busty ladies - great for workwear basics), Mimi Holliday at www.damaris.co.uk/ (top of my wish list - the underwear is utterly gorgeous but not for the bargain-hunter) and www.rigbyandpeller.com (top quality A-J cup bras direct from London, this is where the queen gets hers). While small boobs are a fashion blessing, there can be the odd downside to being modestly endowed. One of my dykier friends frequently gets mistaken for a boy and hit on by gay men. Perhaps if her boobs were a cup-size or two bigger she wouldn’t have to put up with this kind of shit.
The Coming Out Ritual
Why do so many lesbians step out of the closet and straight into the nearest hair salon, then across the road for a tattoo and a tank top or twelve to correspond with their newly unleashed sexual identity?
Image overhaul is often an important stage in the coming out process. Dressing the part can ease the whole ordeal and minimise the need for explanations. If your hair announces your sexuality, you don’t have to.
But lesbian hair is the topic of much controversy. It has its devotees, its converts and its critics. Some deny it even exists. There may be no such thing as homosexual hair, but I do know a lot of homos with the same haircut.
It is said that when a woman cuts her hair she is about to make a great change in her life. When pictures surfaced of Britney’s shaved head the world’s media pounced on this “proof” of her mental breakdown. When Queen Elizabeth I had her auburn mane sheared off she shed her sexual past along with her locks and declared she had been reborn a virgin and was married to England. When Shane McCutcheon gave Jennifer Schechter a pixie crop, girls started cruising her in the street.
People take notice when a woman cuts her hair.
The act of a lesbian cutting her hair is simultaneously revolutionary and conformist. While she may be defiantly rejecting the traditional notion of female beauty she is embracing a new, albeit more comfortable, aesthetic and identifying herself to other gay women, potentially improving her chances of romantic success.
Or is it nothing to do with other people and more about finally feeling free to accept and express yourself as you are, not how others think you should be? Perhaps your haircut and your sexuality are not so directly linked. It seems natural that at a time when you are exploring and discovering yourself both your style and your self-expression will evolve.
It should be noted that sadly not all women with short hair are gay. Equally lots of girls with flowing locks, myself including, are. I’m fed up with people persistently assuming I’m straight or at best bi. I come out as often as possible and shout my head off at rallies for gay rights yet I still get mistaken for a fag hag. If I got a faux-hawk and a singlet would it warn off misguided men? I’ve tried giving them evils but they seem to take any form of attention, even if it’s a withering glare and a kick in the shin, as a come on.
During my own transition from closeted schoolgirl to debutante dyke my haircut didn’t change, the main reason being that my already round face would look positively spherical if it didn’t have a tousled mane to camouflage it. I admit to dallying with the idea after spending time in gay bars. I wanted to fit in and not be mistaken for my girlfriend’s straight mate. However I have decided to express myself through expensive dresses and earrings instead. I reason that hair does not have a sexuality. I do.
TheFashionRox for LOTL.com - June 2009 column
Checked shirt + skinny jeans + short hair = dyke chic. Until now.
The fashion magazines keep banging on about “boyfriend chic” urging their readers to don suit jackets with their skinny jeans and swap their stilettos for a pair of sensible brogues. Celebrity fans include Agyness Deyn, who teams her flannel with bovver boots, Katie Holmes, whose daytime dress-code is slouchy-sexy, and LC of The Hills, who has a weakness for plaid shirts and fedoras. Obviously Sam Ronson dresses like this every day.
I'm down with the look but what’s all this “boyfriend” bollocks? We gay girls and our GIRLFRIENDS have been sexing up menswear for years. We may not have invented stylish androgyny but we worked that look in such numbers that it became synonymous with lesbian fashion, a fact which the press repeatedly ignores.
I’m not suggesting for a moment that all lesbians dress alike. I, for one, own forty-eight dresses and not a single tank top. But you can’t deny there’s a prevalent look, especially on the scene. Just minutes into my first night out in a gay bar I had an alarming realisation. I was the only woman not wearing a blazer.
With every other straight girl in the street now wearing a version of what was once our statement Sapphic style, our gaydar guns may need retuning. So can you tell if a girl is gay by what she is wearing?
The key to deciphering a woman’s sexuality may not be what she wears but the way she wears it. Typically, but not always, the straight-girl interpretations are softer and safer, balancing any masculine tailoring with coquettishly feminine touches. The lezzas often look more striking with harder lines and spikier hairstyles.
Context is crucial. Clearly the same outfit holds different connotations when worn at a pride parade than it does on, say… a date with a man. Also notable is the way it is all put together. Hairstyle, make-up, tats, piercings and the all-important length of fingernails provide further clues to the interpreter. Despite my addiction to all things girly, I would never leave the house with overgrown talons.
And what about the full-on femmes wearing lippy and leopard-print - can you tell us apart from similarly dressed straight girls? The difference is the target audience. Most of us dress to express ourselves and wear what we feel comfortable in or attracted to. It is said that “women dress for other women” but while straight girls are hoping to impress in the style stakes, queer girls also want to turn other women on. We are framed by a female rather than a male gaze of desire. If a so-called “lipstick lesbian” is mistakenly locked by the wrong gaze she may be prone to snarling and flicking the Vs in a most unladylike fashion.
Style stereotypes can help to determine a woman’s sexuality. But with designer androgyny proliferating on the high street and increased sightings of lesbians in skirts, the only surefire way to get an accurate gaydar reading is to concentrate above the neckline and zoom in on the way she looks at you.