Pirate fashion is coming, and this is how the 'It' girls will be styling it

WORDS Jasmine Pirovic PHOTOGRAPHY IMAXTree PUBLISHED Sun, 25 Feb 2024 - 2:00 pm

Lately, I've been thinking a lot about Kate Moss and her Vivienne Westwood Pirate Boots. Those beaten up bits of sandy leather that were buckled and bound to her feet (and Sienna Miller's) for much of the early noughties. Call me unserious, but I feel a wave of pirate fashion coming on. The ship has sailed and docked right on our shores. So be prepared for nautical stripes, huge belts and ruffles to come climbing down that rope ladder.

Of course, we can't talk about pirate fashion without drawing Aunt Viv into the conversation. Her 1981 collection Pirates, for most of us, is where it all began. According to Adam Ant, Malcolm McLaren was obsessed with the film The Island and Vivienne Westwood with 18th Century dandies leading up to the collection's creation.

What's more, Pirates would sew the foundation of the New Romantics look, with its outsized proportions, Hussar Jackets, androgyny and seafaring bravado. It's these 80s silhouettes, like bubble skirts and leg-warmer-like boots we're witnessing on the runways and in recent collections from Louis Vuitton to Danish darling Nicklas Skovgaard.

But trend cycles are never just a matter of rinse and repeat. Kate Moss's boots are proof of that. She never styled them with knickerbockers or frilly blouses, though she of all people could've pulled it off, preferring to pair them with denim cut-offs and skinny jeans, fur coats and later, the McQueen skull scarf. Nor do I think we'll be donning Buccaneer hats (you can unclench your jaw). This new order of pirate style has collected other influences along the way. Take the corsetry and taffeta skirts of John Galliano's Spring 1993 collection.

Also, with the way fashion has been drenched in noughties nostalgia, Alexander McQueen's Spring 2003 collection with its capri pants, tattered ruffles, waistcoats, tan leathers, and skirts belted and pleated (hello Chopova Lowena) comes to mind. As does Jean Paul Gaultier's Spring 2008 ready-to-wear presentation, featuring a look worn by Sasha Pivovarova that leads me to believe Nicolas Ghesquière pored over the collection while preparing for Louis Vuitton SS24.

But don't take my word for it. TikTok might not be where fashion begins, but like Depop, it's a great place to take the temperature of a moment. There are signs, already, of people referring to themselves as "giving pirate" or maybe it's their colleagues perceiving their Gimaguas belts as pirate-like. And they're not wrong.

So batten down the hatches, below find proof that pirate core might soon be in our vocabulary.