How Hedi Slimane gave heroin chic it’s grand finale
Heroin chic is something you may have heard of a while ago but even if you didn’t, you may understand it just based on the name. A long time(think, three or four decades) ago, the world was so extremely obsessed with emaciated physiques, that the correlation between the high fashion world’s idea of beauty and the general aesthetic of heroin addicts was too noticeable for fashion houses not to take advantage of. And so was birthed heroin chic — a time in fashion that paired sickly thin, hollow-cheeked models with grungy, punk rock and nomadic imagery.
Tom Ford, who was the creative director of Gucci in 1994 during the height of this craze, explains the fashion world’s affinity with addicts rather poetically, stating:
“The goal is to look like you’ve seen everything, done everything, been everywhere. It’s an intimidating look, and the drug thing is a continuation of all that. If you look like you’ve been out all night, it conjures up all these images in your head.”
In a weird way he is right. But despite him showing a novel understanding of the conceptualization of this trend, neither Ford nor Gucci would be the ones to make the biggest statements within this channel. For it would be none other than Hedi Slimane.
In the year 2000, Slimane was just coming off of a creative high as artistic director of Yves Saint Laurent. He had just debuted his Black Tie collection showcasing the mere beginnings of the silhouette he would then go onto make his signature. A particularly dark and leathery collection, Black Tie showcased the French designer’s impassioned relationship with being skinny in a way that retained much of the rawness of teenage insecurity.
He was very accomplished at this point in his career, but he had decided to leave YSL. Upon the exit of Jil Sander from his titular fashion line, he approached Hedi with a creative director position, but Hedi declined. When he was offered a similar directorship at Christian Dior however, he accepted. Thus began Dior Homme by Hedi Slimane, a tempestuous 7 year relationship that would take the controversial heroin chic and give it it’s season finale.
It was at this time that he fully absorbed heroin chic and made it his own, beginning iconically with “Solitaire”, his 2001 menswear collection. Solitaire was extremely familiar, revisiting much of the stiffness and composure of his preceding YSL collection and with an added hurriedness.
Let’s skip a little bit to Dior Homme’s 2003 collection, “Luster”. It was bold and striking and gritty and imposing. It was badass and had an exuberant swagger with models wrapped in leather and chains.
Hearing Hedi’s description however is very indicative of the mindset that is creating these looks:
“It’s really elongated and very very, sort of, lean and quite aerodynamic too, like there was this idea of creating the movement using the structure of the clothes.”
But the collection where Hedi Slimane really reimagined proportions and took his silhouette to a new level was “Victim of the Crime” in 2004. The rethinking of so many iconic menswear pieces but most importantly the suit. The working mans uniform became something fun and an asset to the rock and roll “looks” that so many wanted to emulate.
In a 2005 interview with GQ, he reflects on this creation saying:
“So I thought I should work more on the idea that you wear a suit or a jacket because of the fun it can provide, because it’s a game, because it might even have a sexual quality. Not status, or an idea of power. I wanted to develop a collection that wouldn’t be scary or like a duty — like you have to wear it.”
But this collection’s inclusion of the skirt was a warm rumination on heroin chic’s associations with androgynous style as well as Slimane’s stint as David Bowie’s stage stylist.
From there, the machine he that he was becoming kept creating and revolutionizing. From his untitled collections for 2005, to his 2006 works TheWorldWasAMessButHisHairWasPerfect and These Gray Days, he continued to push boundaries as his models of choice only became skinnier and skinnier.
The collection that would stay the longest and have the biggest impact for him though, would be his last collection, “Navigate”.
Set to the tune of These New Puritans song of the same name, the boys come walking out sleeves sitting just past their fingertips and with pants ever so slightly shorter. Every piece is glamorously bottomed with leather boots and the hardcore edge that Hedi has been perfecting for over 7 years is now intricately sharpened. There is so much reservation yet so much already being conveyed. This is the assembly that would go on to change so much of menswear and rightfully so, and fittingly, none of it will be able to be done again.
Models aren’t skinny like this anymore, especially males. There are actually laws against this and for good reason. It’s extremely unhealthy and unpractical and unjust to the larger people who are constantly subject to fatphobia.
But part of why Hedi is legendary, is that he is what he is selling. He is the skinny insecure boy trying to make statements and surprise but also scare a little bit. He took something with which he was given little leeway, that being menswear, and something that was not all too well revered in menswear, a razor thin model and in combining the two he was able reboot men’s clothing detail by detail, while changing the way that weight was considered in menswear. And while I am glad that the world has moved on from the obsession with skinny, I can’t help but also feel glad that another part of toxic masculinity, that humiliates those who use different avenues to convey their maleness, was expelled for a bit — and hopefully forever.
