The highlight of the global fashion calendar is New York’s Met Gala Ball. It is the industry’s Oscars, featuring a cavalcade of celebs competing for attention in outfits that would make Dame Edna Everage look like an Anita Brookner heroine.
Conducted with a po-faced self-importance at odds with some of the quite hilarious spectacles it provides, it really is fashion’s annual Emperor’s New Clothes extravaganza. Supermodel Cara Delevingne went out of her way to prove it this year by turning up in very little apart from a pair of golden nipple saucers.
Kim Kardashian, meanwhile, attempted to “break the internet” by wearing the $5million sequinned sheath dress Marilyn Monroe donned to coo Happy Birthday to JFK in 1962. The style stunt spared us the usual method Ms Kardashian uses to conquer cyberspace – inflicting her bare bum on Instagram.
And it also illustrated that modern celebrity isn’t a patch on old-school glamour. The aura of Marilyn transformed what is a pretty ordinary flesh-coloured sparkly frock into a garment for a goddess. But when Kim Kardashian put it on, she just looked as if she’d bagged an occasion wear bargain from Per Una.
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A far more interesting exploration of fashion is provided this month from an unexpected quarter – Rugby World magazine. The sporting glossy has designated the current mag as “The Style Issue” – a celebration of “style on and off the pitch”.
Features span subjects from players launching their own clothing ranges and the design science behind a top-tier rugby shirt to the psychological analysis of whether appearance makes an impact on performance.
There’s a fashion shoot and interview with French fly half Romain Ntamack, describing him as “effortlessly elegant both on and off the pitch”. Smouldering in Eden Park tailoring, Ntamack shares his love of retail therapy and reveals he’s always been interested in fashion.
“I know lots of rugby players who like to dress smartly and pay attention to how they dress. I think it’s important because it helps our image as rugby players where we spend most of our time covered in mud from the pitch.”
He adds: “There are others who take an interest in fashion, not always with the same success.” His halfback partner Antoine Dupont attempting to rock a canary yellow bathrobe but looking like a duckling version of Sesame Street’s Big Bird on the cover of GQ magazine springs to mind.
Rugby World’s cover boy is Joe Marler. Resplendent in a scarlet tracksuit and PVC puffer ensemble, England’s maverick hooker has penned a welcome letter championing a player’s right to be an individual in a team sport.
He cites his own eye-catching barnet – and indeed there’s a whole article on rugby hair trends which explains, among other things, the alarming mullet revival that has seen an outbreak of Shane Byrne lookalikes in packs across the land.
Marler’s choice of hairstyle hasn’t endeared him to traditionalists. Martin Johnson told him to ditch it when the player broke on to the international scene.
“I remember when I first came through and had a Mohican,” he recalls. “People said ‘You have to make sure you play well if you look like that.’ That works both ways – it forces me to back it up.”
Only one Welsh player makes the magazine’s 12-strong roll call of Style Icons – Barry John. Criteria for inclusion includes: “Genius that comes naturally. Easy class. An effortless cool.” The King ticks all those boxes and was considered a style icon off the field in the country that crowned him. As Barry once told me, the Lions of 71 impressed staid New Zealanders with their trendier clothes and haircuts.
In fashion terms, it’s good to see a player of Barry’s vintage make the cut as he comes from the BG era – Before Gavin. Welsh rugby metrosexuality is usually deemed to have begun with Henson’s first coating of St Tropez.
Gerald Davies wore a cravat, Ieuan Evans launched his own aftershave and Bob Norster is credited as the first Welsh rugby player to bring hair gel into the dressing room but no-one living BG scaled the Henson heights of “look at me” style.
His image-consciousness was there from the start. I interviewed Henson for a magazine as a shy teenager after he’d won World Junior Player of the Year. “I love my labels,” he’d smiled, describing his latest designer jumper purchase. Then the photographer arrived. He looked panic-stricken. “I didn’t realise there would be pictures,” he said, “I haven’t done my hair!”
And he wasn’t joking. We eventually compromised as he produced a beanie hat and pulled it over his un-spiked locks for his cover picture.
By the time he swung a silky-smooth orange leg and kicked the silver-booted penalty that launched Wales on the journey that brought our first Grand Slam for 27 years the nation was in thrall to the Henson Style. As Eddie Butler beamed back in 2005: “Shave away Gavin, shave away!”
Rugby World explores the psychology of what Sean Holley calls “Gavin’s superhero costume” with the help of Cardiff Met professor and former Dunvant lock Stephen Mellalieu: “Rugby is a confrontational sport, so you need to feel confident. Being a contact sport, confidence derives a lot from your physical preparation,” he explains.
“Physical appearance is almost an extension of that. If you feel good about your appearance, that’s going to be part of the confidence going into it. A shave and a haircut won’t make you run faster but it’s all wrapped up in the preparation. Clean boots, white boots, multi-coloured boots, clean-shaven, fresh haircut – it’s all preparing for the battle. That readiness helps confidence.”
Henson embodied this “look good, play well” approach but flashy boots, Cuprinol-coloured thighs and sculpted spikes meant nothing without innate talent and experience – a lesson several orange wannabes had to learn.
As Sean Holley told Rugby World, there were young players imitating Henson’s appearance but not his performance. “Gav was a top-class player and had a lot of success. But we had an issue where young guys would come in with flash cars or fake tans in the middle of winter so we brought in ‘ban the tan’. It was a little tongue in cheek but it made our point. We said you can only have a fake tan if you have 50 caps for your country.”
For what is style without substance? Whether you’re a sports star or a celebrity. A silver boot won’t help you kick like Gavin Henson in his pomp. And a $5million dollar dress can’t make Kim Kardashian sparkle like Marilyn.
