What’s nude and smooth and hot for summer? Pantyhose! Pantyhose are back in a big way. So big, they’re considered to be a major trend. Even celebrities like Katy Perry, Ariana Grande, Beyonce and Jennifer Lopez are wearing them. I don’t know about you, but I’m a happy girl. Other than youth, nothing makes your legs look better than pantyhose. As one fashionable girlfriend of mine said, “Pantyhose take the age off your legs. They’re concealer for the legs.”
REGARDLESS OF HOW HARD YOU WORKOUT, OR WHETHER YOU USE SELF-TANNER, UNLESS YOU’RE YOUNG, THIN AND VERY FIT, MOST OF US ARE KIDDING OURSELVES IF WE THINK OUR LEGS ARE “ALL THAT” WITHOUT PANTYHOSE.
It may have been Carrie Bradshaw and her sans hose Sex & The City girlfriends who caused pantyhose to lose favor. It was then that trend watchers decided they were “old lady looking,” and they may have been right. Most pantyhose, then, looked like the support hose our mothers wore. In 2007, Allure magazine told their readers to “lose the hose.”
Today everyone from fashion models to royalty are wearing pantyhose. During my conversation last week with Ken Downing, Fashion Director for Neiman Marcus, Ken told me pantyhose were on all the runways in Paris. Some style watchers credit Kate Middleton with single-handedly bringing them back in vogue. If the Duchess of Cambridge is wearing a dress, or a skirt, you can bet she’s wearing pantyhose. Since her engagement to Prince William, pantyhose sales have gone up 11 percent in the US and 85 percent in the UK.
This week Good Morning America asked host, Amy Robach, to guess which of four women were wearing pantyhose. While Robach was sure about only one, in fact, all four were wearing them. Today’s pantyhose are made with a new technology. They’re thinner, more durable, and they match a wider range of skin tones. Oh! Don’t forget they’re also either sheer all the way to the waist—which is kind of sexy—and control top. In case you’re wondering, Donna Karan’s “The Nudes” is the top selling brand.
Back in the day, my favorite brand was Christian Dior. It was almost impossible to tell whether a woman was wearing their pantyhose. Years ago, a couple of young girls, sitting next to me in church, got up the nerve to ask if I was, or wasn’t wearing them. They’d been debating and couldn’t agree. Sadly Christian Dior has discontinued their brand, or at least they’re no longer sold in the US. Occasionally you can find a vintage pair on eBay.
If you don’t want to wear pantyhose, here are my “Five Tips to Great Looking Legs.” They must work because the other day, a woman sitting next to me in the airport pointed to my knee and asked, “What do you use on your legs? They look great.”
By the way, if anyone makes a trip to Paris and you find a box of Christian Dior, Sandalfoot, French Taupe, in a Medium, I’ll pay handsomely for them!
PS: Remember when MadMen’s Don Draper told a woman in a bar, “What you call love was invented by guys like me to sell nylons?” I love that line! Regardless of whether that’s true, men love a woman with great looking legs. Will you start wearing pantyhose again?
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