Fifty Shades of Black

Put your Black Rags on, Babes! It’s the festive season. I was at a party the other night. The mostly French women there were dressed in deepest black from topknot to stiletto. There was plenty of texture, lace, damask, crochet, bits of fur and fluff—but black. I was the only woman wearing a colour! Shocking pink! One other British woman was wearing a white cardigan and my friend Tara was in a silver top.

Shopping for something new? Every boutique window in my quartier of St Honoré is draped in, yes, Black. With one exception, that of a recently opened boutique in the Rue Place Marché St Honoré where the windows are filled with multi-coloured trousers, jackets and sleeveless dyed fur gilets. I’m not quite sure I’ve understood the formula or the marketing sense. I don’t know where a Parisian would go dressed in these clothes. To her country house perhaps?. A friend of mine who lectures in fashion complains that going on the Metro in the morning is “like going to a funeral.” And the mood matches the colour. Somber.

The only women one sees dressed colourfully on the streets are usually artists. But generally, coloured clothes are not considered chic. I have heard a shade of magenta described as “flashy.”

Recent fashion seasons made grey into the new black and recently one of the boutiques in Rue St Honoré was displaying clothes in shades of beige and brown mingled with white, one of this year’s fashion favorites until the Christmas window displays took over. When I cycled down Rue St Roch on Daisy Belle just before Christmas I was shocked to see that, even the Pronuptia boutique was displaying long black dresses. Eek! Is black in for weddings now too?

To anyone who knows anything about the effect of colour on the spirits, this black fixation could be one reason why so many Parisians are on anti-depressants. Not that black cannot be sexy and alluring, but the sight of sallow unmade up faces framed with non descript black puffa jackets gives one the heebie jeebies. That’s why a slash of red lipstick or a nattily coiled scarf in some bright shade of anything but black can offer relief. And if French women have a talent it's for draping and coiling that foulard. Lately it seems they are not bothering with those flashes of colour. The endless procession of black clad bodies in the street (in baggy leggings and puffa jackets) says something about the French woman’s fear of being different from the crowd. At work she wants to avoid being conspicuous. Out for the evening, she wants to be the most attractive and chic of any group but she does not want to be too adventurous. But could this black fixation be a statement of class? Are we talking petit bourgeois? It is evident in my turns around the streets of St Honore and up into Rue Faubourg St Honore that it’s the more expensive shops that display coloured clothes. Does money mean a greater sense of liberation from convention, a carefree self expression? Or could it be that these very expensive boutiques in Rue Castiglione and the Faubourg St Honoré are patronized by rich foreign women? My feeling is that French women always prefer black whatever their social status.

One evening coming home on the Metro from a dinner at a friend’s, I was impressed by two elegant women in expensive looking, fur trimmed black coats. They sat opposite me and I watched them fascinated. They were clearly from the upper bourgeoisie, confident, manicured and well heeled, expressing a hard self absorption. To their right a young girl, with loose hair and pretty without make up in baggy beige jodhpur leggings with trainers and a brown puffa jacket looked them up and down repeatedly. Her clothes, her open mouthed expression and her wooly-hatted boyfriend suggested students. The more she looked at her rich sisters, the more she portrayed a yearning for something beyond her reach, a sense of being denied entrance to an unattainable world. The rich sisters, at a guess in their late thirties or early forties had clearly made a substantial investment in new winter coats. What other colour would they choose than black?

The girl gave a resigned sigh and leaned back against her boyfriend’s shoulder, envious eyes shut. Ah, I thought, surely love is better than a rich black coat?