Corona Daily 395: Pandemic Beards and Bras

The April-June wardrobe for the world was joggers, pyjamas, t-shirts, shorts, sweatpants and gowns. A few sets of wash and wear, comfy clothes worn repeatedly. People working online focused more on tops; the same dark pair of trousers could be worn even when it mismatched with the shirt. With no weddings and no evening parties, why would anyone buy elegant clothes?

The lockdown lifestyle of less exercise and more food makes wearing skintight clothes difficult anyway. When belts are no longer needed to hold up trousers, it can be depressing. Loose clothes offer comfort, both physical and psychological.

The clothes customers order from home during this lockdown are usually for home use. Tapestry’s stores cancelled 500 million dollars worth of orders for handbags, jackets and dresses. Chanel, of the famous no. 5 perfume, announced the next two years will be tough for its top luxury brands. Before international travel’s downturn, duty-free shops were the main sales avenues for luxury brands.

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Many women, including models and actresses, have reported not wearing bras for three months. Liberation from tyranny, they call it.  Despite a legitimate bra need for health reasons or sports activities, the lockdown has provoked a bra-less movement. Articles titled ‘death of the bra’ are probably an exaggeration. But where sales have re-started, non-wired bras are replacing push-ups, balconettes and slinky lacy varieties.

A byproduct of this liberation is women making face masks out of their bras. Japanese model Yumeno Asahina gave tutorials on how to convert bras into masks. Although not as protective as the N95 masks, they are colourful and aesthetically more pleasing.

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Lipstick is another casualty. Why apply lipstick, if you have to wear a mask on top? Women who tried it complain of the mask smudging the lipstick. Unless a girl is Zoom dating, lipstick has lost its purpose. Beauty advisors now advise women to focus on the eyes. Use mascaras, false eyelashes, eye liners, bold and glamorous brows.

Women in Saudi Arabia invest much time on makeup and perfumes. Wearing an expensive burqa and a heady perfume is a fashion statement for an invisible Saudi woman. Women will be women; they will find ways through masks and lockdowns.

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Lockdowns have also affected the shaving patterns of men. (I can talk with greater authority about beards than bras). With no hairdresser around for months, grooming was abandoned by many.  And if after a clean shave and a Gillette-smooth chin, one has to wear a mask to cover it, why shave regularly? Why apply an aftershave if nobody except your house inmates can smell it?

In the absence of dyeing, many heads and beards are showing their true colour. Some men have opted to sport ugly-looking, untrimmed beards. Shabby clothes, an uncombed hairdo, and graying wayward beards tell us how men take their families for granted.  

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Will some of these habits continue post-pandemic? I don’t think so. The world is a theatre, and currently most theatres are shut. Offices, discos, weddings, parties, award ceremonies are different stages where we play roles. Theatre is more effective when actors perform in the right costumes. Post-pandemic; elegant bras, clean-shaven faces, custom-made suits, glowing lipstick will all return.

The theatre of life has never stopped because of a mere pandemic.

Ravi