The first time Annabel Lwin hit the scene, she wasn’t wearing anything. Some might say it was all down hill from there, but I beg to differ. When Malcolm McLaren put the fourteen-year old singer of Bow Wow Wow on a record cover, sitting nude on the grass in an homage to Manet’s Déjeuner sur l’Herbe, her fellow musicians were dressed like Johnny Depp in Pirates of the Caribbean. It didn’t take Annabel long to figure out that she’d got the rum deal.
The next time we saw her, she was wearing a puffy shirt.
And soon after, the only thing missing from her ensemble was a parrot perched on her shoulder.
Pirate Dressing was not a very cool label for a bunch of kids who were determined to get past the door Nazi at London’s Blitz Club, so New Romanticism was born. Being a New Romantic required spending more time getting ready to go out than actually being out. This was style over substance on a grand scale. And nobody did it better than Adam Ant.
And because Boy George worked as a hat-check girl at the Blitz, and because his appearance in 80s Style Tip # 2 was not very representative, and because he gives us a fountain of dress-up possibilities, here he is again.
Still don’t know what to wear?
Watch this space for a week of style blitz mania.
….you should really put the one of her naked up there so at least we can compare…
… wouldn’t want to risk you getting inspired and turning up au naturel…