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Heroin Chic
YEN TAKES A LOOK AT THE ‘HEROIN CHIC’ FAD THAT SWEPT THE ‘90S FASHION SET
It’s the mid ‘90s, grunge music and the Seattle sound have taken hold, and praying mantises are stalking down the catwalks of fashion centres worldwide. Pale skinny models in loose fitting flannelette shirts and faux scruffy styles heralded an aesthetic dubbed by the press as ‘heroin chic.’ A mildly hysterical catchphrase – perhaps some models were on the nod, backstage with needles poking out of their arms – but that was cool, because stylists and designers were enamoured by their empty dark sunken eyes, fine, blow-away hair and the way the garments hung from their limbs in that super-sexy sickly way.
THE POSTER GIRL
Kate Moss, now a modern day icon who has transcended simple super model status, was pinned as the poster girl for this frightening fad. Though she was never proved to be or admitted to using heroin, as fellow model James King had, it was Moss’s lithe physique and slouchy demeanour that launched the ‘waif’ look, and the supermodels of yore – the Cindy Crawford’s and Claudia Schiffer’s – with their naturally buxom physiques, became passé.
It was British photographer Corinne Day who plucked Moss from obscurity, or rather from the pages of Storm modelling agencies books. Day came across the recently scouted 14-year-old Kate Moss, sought her out and became her friend. They listened to Nirvana and The Stone Roses together, did photo shoots at her house, and in 1990, when Moss was 15, they went to the seaside to shoot. This image became the iconic Kate Moss cover of The Face and Day’s raw depiction of Moss’s unaffected, scrawny beauty captured the fashion zeitgeist of 1990s Britain.
“I liked her as soon as I saw her,” Day said in 2005. “I think there was
a bit of narcissism there because she was 5’7” and skinny like me. I’d been tortured at school for my shape, and had a hard time for it as a model. I thought she’d have some of the problems I’d had and wanted to help.” Day continued, “The ‘grunge look’, as people called my style, simply showed girls as they really are, without make-up, styled hair and flattering light.”
After the publication of Day’s May 1993 story for British Vogue, in which the young model lolled vacantly around her apartment with spilled ashtrays and old coffee cups, Moss become the leitmotif in every tabloid discussion of body size. Day was blamed for encouraging anorexia, drugs, even paedophilia and promoting her own brand of heroin chic. “I just thought it was all bollocks, basically,” Moss told SHOWStudio in 2006. “It was upsetting sometimes, but I was really young and skinny and some girls just are. That was me, I wasn’t trying to be anyone else.”
ALL FUN AND GAMES UNTIL SOMEONE DIES OF AN OVERDOSE
The furore erupted following the overdose death of prominent fashion photographer, David Sorrenti. Amy Spindler, the then fashion editor of The New York Times, published a shot of James King – Sorrenti’s girlfriend at the time of his death – slumped on a bed, clothes torn, face sullen and rake thin. Around her were portraits of drug casualties: Sid Vicious, Kurt Cobain and the Grateful Dead. The picture was taken by Sorenti. If Spindler coined the phrase ‘heroin chic’ and drew attention to what she perceived as a new school of fashion photography responsible for the idealisation of heroin abuse, it took then US President, Bill Clinton, to run with it and make the term something familiar to every household both in America and overseas. “You do not need to glamorise addiction to sell clothes,” Clinton famously told the US nation. “The glorification of heroin
is not creative, it’s destructive. It’s not beautiful, it is ugly. And this is not about art, it’s about life and death.”
FASHIONS FADE YET HEROIN REMAINS
The heroin chic look brought fashion into mainstream cultural concern and drew much criticism, especially from anti-drug groups. Reports of Clinton’s speech promoted the first mention of the term in mainstream British newspapers, just at the time when designers, photographers and editors were feeling the pressure to reassess the value of the style. Thirteen British fashion designers are reported to have signed a statement in October 1997 condemning the heroin look, marking the formation of a group called Designers Against Addiction.
Other commentators denied that fashion images made drug use itself more attractive. “There is no reason to expect that people attracted to the look promoted by advertisers... will also be attracted to heroin, any more than suburban teenagers who wear baggy pants and backward caps will end up shooting people from moving cars,” Jacob Sullum wrote in Reason magazine in 1997.
Models in the ‘90s were no more bulimic, nicotine-soaked or coked-up than before. Designers simply had a new look – and needed a catchphrase for it.
The trend eventually faded, perhaps in part due to Sorrenti’s death, who Moss also dated. It would seem Moss hasn’t grown up much since then, with doe-eyed crack-head Doherty galloping around after her. Yet she still manages to hold the British nation in a sphinx-like gaze.
Despite a recent return to the fashion fold, Corinne Day remains unapologetic for taking a raw, unflinching look at the world. She says, “Photography is getting as close as you can to real life, showing us things we don’t normally see. These are people’s most intimate moments, and sometimes intimacy is sad.”
WORDS Millie Ross
IMAGERY Getty Images
It’s the mid ‘90s, grunge music and the Seattle sound have taken hold, and praying mantises are stalking down the catwalks of fashion centres worldwide. Pale skinny models in loose fitting flannelette shirts and faux scruffy styles heralded an aesthetic dubbed by the press as ‘heroin chic.’ A mildly hysterical catchphrase – perhaps some models were on the nod, backstage with needles poking out of their arms – but that was cool, because stylists and designers were enamoured by their empty dark sunken eyes, fine, blow-away hair and the way the garments hung from their limbs in that super-sexy sickly way. THE POSTER GIRL
Kate Moss, now a modern day icon who has transcended simple super model status, was pinned as the poster girl for this frightening fad. Though she was never proved to be or admitted to using heroin, as fellow model James King had, it was Moss’s lithe physique and slouchy demeanour that launched the ‘waif’ look, and the supermodels of yore – the Cindy Crawford’s and Claudia Schiffer’s – with their naturally buxom physiques, became passé.
It was British photographer Corinne Day who plucked Moss from obscurity, or rather from the pages of Storm modelling agencies books. Day came across the recently scouted 14-year-old Kate Moss, sought her out and became her friend. They listened to Nirvana and The Stone Roses together, did photo shoots at her house, and in 1990, when Moss was 15, they went to the seaside to shoot. This image became the iconic Kate Moss cover of The Face and Day’s raw depiction of Moss’s unaffected, scrawny beauty captured the fashion zeitgeist of 1990s Britain.
“I liked her as soon as I saw her,” Day said in 2005. “I think there was
a bit of narcissism there because she was 5’7” and skinny like me. I’d been tortured at school for my shape, and had a hard time for it as a model. I thought she’d have some of the problems I’d had and wanted to help.” Day continued, “The ‘grunge look’, as people called my style, simply showed girls as they really are, without make-up, styled hair and flattering light.”
After the publication of Day’s May 1993 story for British Vogue, in which the young model lolled vacantly around her apartment with spilled ashtrays and old coffee cups, Moss become the leitmotif in every tabloid discussion of body size. Day was blamed for encouraging anorexia, drugs, even paedophilia and promoting her own brand of heroin chic. “I just thought it was all bollocks, basically,” Moss told SHOWStudio in 2006. “It was upsetting sometimes, but I was really young and skinny and some girls just are. That was me, I wasn’t trying to be anyone else.”
ALL FUN AND GAMES UNTIL SOMEONE DIES OF AN OVERDOSE
The furore erupted following the overdose death of prominent fashion photographer, David Sorrenti. Amy Spindler, the then fashion editor of The New York Times, published a shot of James King – Sorrenti’s girlfriend at the time of his death – slumped on a bed, clothes torn, face sullen and rake thin. Around her were portraits of drug casualties: Sid Vicious, Kurt Cobain and the Grateful Dead. The picture was taken by Sorenti. If Spindler coined the phrase ‘heroin chic’ and drew attention to what she perceived as a new school of fashion photography responsible for the idealisation of heroin abuse, it took then US President, Bill Clinton, to run with it and make the term something familiar to every household both in America and overseas. “You do not need to glamorise addiction to sell clothes,” Clinton famously told the US nation. “The glorification of heroin
is not creative, it’s destructive. It’s not beautiful, it is ugly. And this is not about art, it’s about life and death.”
FASHIONS FADE YET HEROIN REMAINS
The heroin chic look brought fashion into mainstream cultural concern and drew much criticism, especially from anti-drug groups. Reports of Clinton’s speech promoted the first mention of the term in mainstream British newspapers, just at the time when designers, photographers and editors were feeling the pressure to reassess the value of the style. Thirteen British fashion designers are reported to have signed a statement in October 1997 condemning the heroin look, marking the formation of a group called Designers Against Addiction.
Other commentators denied that fashion images made drug use itself more attractive. “There is no reason to expect that people attracted to the look promoted by advertisers... will also be attracted to heroin, any more than suburban teenagers who wear baggy pants and backward caps will end up shooting people from moving cars,” Jacob Sullum wrote in Reason magazine in 1997.
Models in the ‘90s were no more bulimic, nicotine-soaked or coked-up than before. Designers simply had a new look – and needed a catchphrase for it.
The trend eventually faded, perhaps in part due to Sorrenti’s death, who Moss also dated. It would seem Moss hasn’t grown up much since then, with doe-eyed crack-head Doherty galloping around after her. Yet she still manages to hold the British nation in a sphinx-like gaze.
Despite a recent return to the fashion fold, Corinne Day remains unapologetic for taking a raw, unflinching look at the world. She says, “Photography is getting as close as you can to real life, showing us things we don’t normally see. These are people’s most intimate moments, and sometimes intimacy is sad.”
WORDS Millie Ross
IMAGERY Getty Images
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