My appreciation for couture has never been greater! Were you as impressed with this video as I was?

Let me know in the comments below, and head over to Refinery 29 for more on the making of Dior’s mind-blowingly gorgeous pleated creations.

What does Bobo mean? The term is short for bourgeois and bohemian, two social castes no one ever expected to find mixed up together.

Bobo takes over where the old "gauche caviar," or caviar socialist, left off. Less political and more materialistic, French Bobos tend to design their lifestyles in a mix that includes the rarest luxuries, middle-class classics, senior citizen string-collecting strategies and student-style cheap n' chic. 

 

 

Just because Bobos are quite wealthy doesn't mean they have to wear cashmere. And when they haven't a fortune to spend, Bobos will invest in the very latest technology or an exotic trip and feel privileged despite a shoestring budget. Bobos basically have what money can not buy: almost total freedom of choice. 

Bobo sightings began in the French press in the early 00s, but almost all the reports failed to acknowledge that the term doesn't have its origins in France. It comes from a book by David Brooks called "Bobos in Paradise: The New Upper Class and How They Got There".

Brooks's definition of the group as "highly educated folk who have one foot in the bohemian world of creativity and another foot in the bourgeois realm of ambition and worldly success" outlines the happy state of contradiction Bobos enjoy on both sides of the Atlantic.

I personally consider Bobos as a 'godsend' for fashion. The French aren't technically the world's most dedicated consumers, but French Bobos seem more eager than most to pick up on the latest trends, be it the "trottinette" (scooter), cashmere teddy bears, Prada Sport sneakers or anything on the ground floor of Colette in Paris. 

Behind Paris's Bobo phenomenon is a long-standing desire by the French not to be pigeonholed as straightforward fashion consumers. It's intriguing to see that citizens of the country that serves as the platform for so much fashion innovation are so finicky when it comes to new trends. 

While Italians, Americans or Japanese are capable of putting themselves out head first into the fairly new, the French — and particularly 'Les parisiens' — prefer to wait securely in the lines that run around the Hermes store during its sales. There they are sure to find the clothes that give them that timeless look so celebrated all over the globe. 

French Bobos break the mold a little bit. Mixing old-school with the latest Fendi and perhaps something trendy from the up-to-the-minute and inexpensive Parisian label Paul & Joe, young Parisian women are looking fresher than ever before. But, rest assured, faithfully over their shoulder is an Hermes Birkin bag, or another equally timeless item.

The 60's was a decade which broke loads of fashion traditions and featured a number of diverse trends, such as PVC clothes, mini skirts, tie-dye and batik fabrics, but let's not forget that it was also an age for the rise of the pants suit for women.

 

Before men started putting on the crotch-covering leggings we now call trousers, everybody wore skirts .And why not? Skirts are far simpler to construct and facilitate more cooling air flow to the nether regions, which would’ve been an absolute godsend in the pre-air conditioning era. But then, thanks to the rise of horseback infantries, trousers became the below-the-belt manly uniform of the masculine masses.

Women, meanwhile, continued wearing skirts, and not just simple wrap-around numbers. We’re talking heavy, multi-layered, floor-length ensembles often further supported and puffed out with the assistance of cage crinoline and petticoats or other clunky foundation garments, depending on the era.

Trousers for ladies were trickled into high fashion in 1911 by French designer Paul Poiret, who had earlier done women a solid by introducing corset-free styles. His harem pant, as seen on Downton Abbey, made the cover of Vogue in 1913.Oh! And speaking of Vogue, billowy slacks were becoming more commonplace in its pages by the 1930s, as well as on the pages of celebrity trades that showcased some Hollywood A-listers including Marlene Dietrich and K. Hepburn wearing them on and off screen. For the average well-heeled woman, however, pants couldn’t simply be tossed on effortlessly.

During WWII, American women wore pants in the workplace, dresses and skirts were still the go-to for properly going out in public, and Dior’s post-War New Look, swung the pendulum even farther away from the pant for a period. Really, as Worn Through underscores, it wasn’t until the sexual revolution and second-wave feminism in the late 1960s and 1970s that women started wearing trousers en masse and whenever they wished — for the most part. It wasn’t until 1993, for instance, that Sen. Barbara Mikulski and Carol Moseley-Braun became the first woman senators to rock pantsuits on Senate floor, forcing the Senate to lift its ban on lady trousers. Hence, while women’s adoption of pants wasn’t fueled by militarism as it was with men, the choice to eschew a skirt was no less an epic struggle.