Herve leger bandage dresses that give you a waist
Peter Thompson, an expert in visual perception from the University of York, says they use a very simple visual trick.
He says: “The dark panels at the sides mean that if you’re standing against a dark, or busy background, the main contour of the body appears to be somewhere that it’s actually not.”
The Stella McCartney dress that Kate Winslet is wearing is actually even cleverer.
“The white and the grey create a shading effect because as humans, we make an assumption that light comes from above and therefore interpret light and dark in terms of shadow. In this case, the grey is seen as a shadow that’s being cast by her breasts, making them look higher than they actually are.”
He says he’s surprised that it’s taken designers this long to cotton on to these tricks. “You could make any woman look better just by exploiting what we know about how our vision works. These are relatively simple techniques but they’re incredibly effective.”
Fortunately, you don’t have to spend thousands to get the look. If you’ve got a friendly local seamstress, you could always ask her to add black panels to a simple shift dress, or head to the High Street where the trend has swiftly been adopted, with everything from bodycon bandage dresses to maxi dresses being given the illusion treatment.
But, if you are planning to emulate Kate and co, Angie Smith has some advice.
“Less is most definitely more,” she says. “Keep your figure looking streamlined by doing away with ankle straps, belts, chokers and dark nail varnish – basically anything that will chop up your figure. You don’t want to distract the eye away from the dress.
Jennifer also admits another guilty pleasure is Project Runway, natch, where she was rocking a skintight herve leger bandage dresses front row seat for the taping.
“I love the show, I think it’s really fun,” she dished to us. “I love seeing all the designers get the chances that they do.”
The former Party of Five actress told us she also has a thing for the show’s mentor, Tim Gunn, and his notorious “make it work” attitude.
“I have a little bit of a crush on [him],” she admitted. “I think he’s so fun, he’s so adorable and he just always looks so dapper, and I just heart him.”
Jennifer quickly added, “I love Heidi [Klum], too.”
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