The Bandage Dress Makes a Comeback

Why the signature style of supermodels is once again in the spotlight

- VANESSA FRIEDMAN

It was, well, bound to happen. Some 15 years after its last renaissance, the bandage dress, that item of clothing invented in the mid-1980s that makes the wearer look as if she has been sucked into a tube, shrink-wrapped and excreted back into the world, is once again resurgent—just as it is every time the twin forces of body culture and economic gloom combine. And with it comes the debate about whether the dress is ultimately about objectification or self-empowerment.

The trend returned in earnest last September, when Kaia Gerber wore a white bandage dress recreated by Hervé Léger to mimic the white Léger bandage dress worn by her mother, Cindy Crawford, to the Oscars in 1993 with Richard Gere. In January, the influencer Olivia Boblet posted a TikTok showing herself in a Hervé Léger bandage dress, which now has 1.7 million views and more than 1,000 comments, most of them essentially reading "finally!" Then, in April, Hailey Bieber wore a Saint Laurent bandage dress to the Fashion Trust US awards, doubling down on the style in early June with a vintage Léger number.

"Criminally hot," Kim Russell, aka the Kimbino, wrote when she reposted a picture of Bieber on Instagram. Bieber responded, "Hervé bandage dresses are back I fear."

Part of this re-emergence is down to the House of CB, a British brand that made its name by introducing the bandage dress to a new generation back in 2010, and reintroduced it as part of its birthday celebrations last month. Part of it has to do with Hervé Léger itself, the brand that popularized the look, which will celebrate its 40th anniversary in September and has gleefully embraced the bandage resurgence.