The Cummerbund Is Back (Rules Optional)
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38 minutes ago
The season's most unlikely It-accessory comes with centuries of etiquette, cultural history and kitschy baggage. Thankfully, its SS27 revival is anything but by the book.
In an age of casual dress and fashion’s notoriously fickle affections, it’s little wonder we’ve found ourselves craving longevity and a little ceremony again. And if SS27’s most unlikely it-accessory – the cummerbund – has taught us anything, it’s less Coco Chanel’s ‘look in the mirror and take one thing off’, and more Oscar Wilde’s ‘you can never be overdressed or overeducated’. Overdressed by design, and all the more interesting when you know the history and the rules you’re breaking, the cummerbund makes a spectacular case for both.
Why The Cummerbund Trend Is Suddenly Everywhere
Unlike a belt, the cummerbund arrives with baggage. For much of the 20th century, wearing one meant participating in a recognised social code and signalling your familiarity with the sartorial etiquette of formal society. Bond wore one. So did generations of assorted gentlemen tasked with deciphering the words ‘black tie‘ at the bottom of an invitation.
Initially, the cummerbund was a gentleman’s 19th century life hack, if you will. Derived from the traditional kamarband, or waist sash, of Persia and South Asia, it was adopted by British officers in India as a cooler alternative to the woollen waistcoat before making its way into civilian wear. For all its high-ranking pedigree, though, respectability was hardly immediate. When it reached French fashion in 1873, one particularly dismayed critic called the now-stalwart of formality a ‘grotesque fashion’ taken up by frivolous young men. Ouch.
But give a sartorial indiscretion long enough and someone will eventually write an etiquette guide for it. The cummerbund social-climbed its way into high society, elbowing out the waistcoat as the favourite and later gracing the suave waists of many a Hollywood leading man. It even had a brief flirtation with kitschiness in the noughties, when jewel-toned satin, matched dutifully to your date’s dress, became a staple of American proms. Yet until now, even at its most mischievous, the cummerbund remained tethered to tradition and occasion.
A New Chapter In Womenswear
For all the rules gathered around it, the cummerbund has spent most of its life changing hands. And this time the prodigal garment has left black tie behind and found its way into womenswear.
In accent colours, styled over substantial knits, cinching jackets and slipped low across the hips, the cummerbund was undeniably the belle of the ball at SS27. A striking number of pleated cummerbunds, though, were worn with their pleats facing downwards, a faux pas at the best of times according to traditional dressing guides. But by the third downward-facing pleat, coincidence begins to look suspicious, rebellious even.
‘I think we’re living through a period where people are much more interested in the history and provenance of what they wear,’ says Daisy Knatchbull, founder of Knatchbull. ‘But at the same time there’s no desire to wear them exactly as they were worn 50 or 100 years ago.’
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MITHRIDATE creative director Daniel Fletcher saw much the same appetite at work with the ‘almost uniform-like’ piece. If anything, knowing its cultural history only added to the cummerbund’s appeal.
At London Fashion Week, MITHRIDATE was among those having the most fun with it: chains, belts and brooches layered over accented cummerbunds, some pleated, some colour-blocked, others slung across the hips. ‘I’m interested in what happens when you take something with such an established identity and shift its meaning,’ Fletcher explains. ‘It becomes much more interesting when it’s used to challenge the silhouette rather than simply complete it.’
And judging by the SS27 runways, that silhouette is increasingly female. The blurring of the lines between menswear and womenswear certainly has something to do with the cummerbund’s resurgence. Womenswear has spent more than a century helping itself to the male wardrobe, and whether through ease or practicality, most garments offered something tangible in return. The cummerbund is a stranger prize, and its principal inheritance is perhaps sartorial tension: between masculine and feminine codes, structure and softness. That tension made the cummerbund particularly fertile ground for womenswear. Knatchbull puts it simply: ‘The most interesting wardrobes are often the ones where those two things coexist.’
On the runway, that borrowing has hardly been deferential. The cummerbund no longer politely disappears between shirt and trouser as intended. Instead it cinches, interrupts, exaggerates and draws the eye. And for Fletcher, that was the point. ‘It was less about making the cummerbund feminine and more about exploring how it could change the proportions of the female silhouette,’ he explains. In womenswear, the cummerbund’s latent potential lies in a little sartorial irreverence and ‘allowing it to feel a little unexpected.’
Mithridate SS27
How To Style It
If you’re looking to trade in a statement belt for a cummerbund this season without feeling as though you’ve misplaced the rest of your tuxedo, fear not: we’ve got you covered.
Knatchbull suggests wearing it ‘with a crisp shirt, a simple knit or underneath a beautifully cut jacket, rather than feeling you have to dress it up.’ As the founder of Savile Row‘s first shopfront exclusively for women, Knatchbull has been comfortably ahead of the curve with this one. The brand’s Cummerbund Cigarette Trouser and Palazzo Trouser have the cummerbund already built in, if you’re looking for an easier introduction to the trend.
Fletcher’s advice? Experiment and don’t overthink it. ‘It doesn’t necessarily need to sit exactly where you’d expect a traditional cummerbund to sit,’ he says. ‘It’s much more interesting when you take it out of that context and make it your own.’ And as MITHRIDATE’s SS27 collection shows, there’s something deliciously contrary about layering belts and brooches over an impeccably neat cummerbund to show off a bit of personality.
Better still, fashion’s latest it-accessory may already be hanging at the back of a father’s wardrobe or languishing beside a partner’s tuxedo. So before buying one new, it may be worth raiding the family black-tie drawer first, or shopping second-hand.
