How to dress the most powerful woman in the world
'05.12.2018'
Source: Tatler
The most powerful woman in the world according to Forbes - German Chancellor Angela Merkel refused to run for a fifth term. We recall what role the corporate identity played in her career and what Karl Lagerfeld said about it.
There are things more important wardrobe
Angela Merkel has held the post of German Chancellor since 2005, reminds Tatler. 13 years at the head of the state - even more than Margaret Thatcher spent on the post of prime minister of Great Britain. They are often compared, and in many ways they are really similar - prudent, serious, ironic. One of the striking differences: Thatcher attached a lot of importance to her appearance, and Merkel, on the contrary, showed absolute indifference to this issue. Her typical set: a three-button jacket, straight pants, shoes or boots with a flat sole.
"Boring images convey frugality and consistency - two things Germans value most in politics," writes Robb Young, author of Power Dressing: First Ladies, Women Politicians and Fashion.
“Her image has always been perceived as an adequate reflection of the individual. A serious rational woman who adheres to a course of consensus policy and is absolutely indifferent to criticizing her style. ”
Contrary to the theory that only talent in combination with a carefully thought out public way can lead to success, Merkel now heads the rating of the most influential women according to Forbes. With her endless costumes (not perfect, let's say, landing) she broadcast only one idea: “I have more important lessons”. And it worked.
Persistence is a sign of mastery
“Angela Merkel is a woman with a very specific sense of style.” She knows what she likes, and she likes what she knows, ”the Daily Mail quipped, closely following the Chancellor’s every exit.
To illustrate the question: on the thespectacleofthetragedy.eu website, the designer has compiled a large table with identical Angela Merkel jackets of different shades like the tables of the Pantone color institute (you can see here и here). He did the same thing in Bloomberg's 2012 - they edited the story “50 shades of Angela Merkel's trouser suits”.
What is shocking here is not the variety of colors, but the fact that the jacket model almost never changes. It is always the same model with three buttons by German designer Bettina Schönbach.
B - thrift
Not only does Merkel wear the same silhouette for almost his entire political career. She is also not shy to wear the same things to events with a difference of several years. The media was outraged when they juxtaposed that in 1996, 2002 and 2014, the Chancellor went out in the same cardigan.
She herself did not comment on this choice, but her supporters on Twitter rightly noted: it is impossible to imagine a situation for someone to consider the repeating costumes of a male politician. Barack Obama went for eight years in a row in the same tuxedo, and if his wife Michelle hadn’t paid attention to it, no one would have noticed.
Karl Lagerfeld displeased
Karl Lagerfeld repeatedly criticized Angela Merkel's style. In an interview with Germany's Focus, he said that the chancellor should take into account the peculiarities of his figure.
“Too long pants, too tight jackets, nightmarish colors. It's not like that! ”Was his final assessment.
At the same time, Lagerfeld let slip that Merkel could give some advice on the style, but every visit to Paris she turns out to be too busy for that.
With all the prosaic wardrobe of the German Chancellor quotes from him from time to time appear on the podium. In 2006, German designer Wolfgang Joop dedicated a whole collection to Angela Merkel.
“The days of tra-la-la-la and the parties in the garden are over. Practicality has come into vogue, ”he concluded. Joop also added that Merkel’s own personality, “strong and fearless,” inspires him.
This fall on the Internet walked the news about Merkel hips. This is how the sculpted jackets Balenciaga from the autumn-winter collection with an emphasized waist and supposedly overlaid hips were designated. Demna Gvasalia himself, the creative director of the brand, did not use this term (because this is a classic silhouette that Cristobal Balenciaga created in the middle of the 20th century).
But the fact that references to the image of Merkel are now being sought on the world's catwalks suggests that the Chancellor’s not the most refined style has become a modern version of the eighty-one power dressing (literally, power).
