The wearing of a baby doll dress by Kurt Cobain, the lead singer of Nirvana and one of the founders of Grunge, provides the most well-known example. Borrowed from his wife Courtney Love, the then singer of the all-girl band the Hole, Cobain adopted the dress, in part, to prove that he was not afraid to express his more feminine side.

 

 

Grunge style, like British Indie Kid style, was "Dressing Down" in both senses - anti-elegant and a middle-class (mis)interpretation of the style of the unprivileged. Its key ingredients were over-sized items bought second-hand in charity shops, army surplus garments and chunky boots. Like the clothes of hippies and punks, there was a strong asexual element to Grunge fashion. It manifested itself in the borrowing of gender symbols from the opposite sex.

 

 

Dress and Trousers
Cotton
French, Jean-Charles de Castelbajac
Spring/ Summer 2001

As well as referencing the dresses worn by Grunge bands, these two ensembles also refer to the 'house coats' worn by suburban women in the 1950's and 1960's.

"My dresses for men have a strong sub-cultural element. In the spirit of Kurt Cobain, they are intended to project both strength and fragility. To this end, I chose to use floral fabrics in pastel hues, but them stamped them with various tattoos".

Grunge originated in Seattle, on the West coast of America, in the late 1980s. A fusion of hippy and punk, it described a new generation or guitar-oriented rock music and the attitude of its exponents. It became associated with the music of groups such as Nirvana, Pearl Jam and the Smashing Pumpkins. At the same time, it provided an identity for the "lost" Generation X'ers, the (generally) white , middle-class young people who could never hope, or even want to, maintain the same levels of economic and material achievement as their parents.