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THE WALL STREET JOURNAL. **** Saturday/Sunday, March 21 - 22, 2020 |D3

STYLE & FASHION

describe the class of particularly

slender 1990s supermodels who

helped popularize the dress. Think

of Kate Moss who, in addition to

wearing a see-through slip to a

party in 1993, marched down the

runways of Marc Jacobs for Perry

Ellis, Prada and Calvin Klein in simi-

larly unsubstantial dresses.

But you know who else isn’t a

waif? Actress Drew Barrymore. Dur-

ing her ’90s tenure as Hollywood’s

pixieish wild child, she pledged de-

votion to the slip dress. Ms. Barry-

more wore long ones on the red car-

pet, accessorized with body glitter

and a daisy in her hair; she chan-

neled the decade’s faux-naiveté by

layering short ones over baby tees;

and she embraced the grunge look

on-screen in 1995’s “Mad Love,”

pairing black boots with a floor-

length slip similar to the one above.

According to New York stylist

Camilla Nickerson, ’90s designers

recognized that the minimalist

dress was resonating with attitudi-

nal youths. Like much of the de-

cade’s fashion, its pared-back purity

offered reprieve from the audacious

extravagance of the ’80s. “It was

the uniform of many,” Ms. Nicker-

son said. “It came to define a cer-

tain mood...the slip dress was a part

of [an] unadorned new beauty.”

Counterintuitively, the flimsy

I

WASTEDmy 20s being ter-

rified of slip dresses. Tradi-

tionally a sheath of vapor-

thin silk held up by two

teeny straps, the slip dress,

to my mind, seemed too scandal-

ously scant to wear outside the bed-

room, let alone to a restaurant or

the office. I admired women confi-

dent enough to venture out in

what’s barely a second skin, but I

gravitate toward protective, sculp-

tural clothing and feared a slip dress

would leave me exposed. What’s

more, I am by no stretch of the

imagination a waif—a term used to

BYKATHARINEK.ZARRELLA

Give Yourself the Slip

Drew Barrymore’s barely-there, minimal 1990s dress has its comeback

STRAP CLUB

Drew Barrymore

photographed in a

white satin slip dress in

1994, the year she

starred in the updated

Western ‘Bad Girls.’

COPYCAT

GETTY IMAGES (BARRYMORE); F. MARTIN RAMIN/THE WALL STREET JOURNAL, STYLING BY ANNE CARDENAS (CLOTHING)

The Over/Under

One of a slip dress’s virtues is

its supreme layerability. Here,

three ways to augment it—

from easy to dressy.

For a Skype-

based client

meeting

Slip Dress,

$545,

nililotan.com;

Blouse,

$1,075, Stella

McCartney,

saksfifth

avenue.com

For a special

dinner at

home

Slip Dress,

$3,500,

gabrielahearst.

com;Blazer,

$520, sandro-

paris.com

For a first

Tinder date

on a summer

evening

Slip Dress,

$725, R13,

r13.com;

T-shirt, $30,

Babaton,

aritzia.com

dress flatters most body types,

particularly when it’s cut on the

bias, meaning the fabric is cut at

an angle. I didn’t realize this until

I finally tried on my first slip at

age 30. In unguessable ways, the

gown-length black column sup-

ported me in all the right places.

In the years since, I’ve worn it

with heels to black-tie holiday

fêtes, with combat boots and a

leather jacket to grab lunch and

barefoot on the beach.

The dress’s accommodating fit

and versatility, plus the fashion in-

dustry’s relentless infatuation with

the 1990s, could account for its

ubiquity in the current spring col-

lections. R13 proposed a grunge-

tinged floral version, and Jil Sander

showed a fluid, wide-strapped take.

New York-based stylist Lilli Mill-

hiser said that these days, the slip

dress is a closet staple—“like a

good pair of jeans.” Liane Wiggins,

head of womenswear at British on-

line luxury retailer Matchesfashion,

agreed. On the Matches website,

shoppers can choose from nearly

200 slip dresses, from the minimal

and affordable to the elaborate and

extravagant. Ms. Wiggins observed

that her customers gravitate toward

more intricate variations, like Ga-

briela Hearst’s lace and pintuck-

pleated leather style for spring.

But a simple slip can serve you

well, as New York-based designer

Nili Lotan attests. Since she intro-

duced it in the late 2000s, her

sumptuously spare silk cami dress,

which comes in a multitude of colors

and two lengths, has been a collec-

tion mainstay and celebrity favorite.

“Clean, timeless, effortless and age-

less,” is how she described the de-

sign, which she recommended pair-

ing with a silk jacket for a late-

spring wedding, an oversize knit for

a #stayhome weekend or a hooded

sweatshirt for venturing into public.

Ms. Wiggins advised buying

your first slip in a neutral hue like

navy, black, champagne or ivory.

She favors natural fibers, rather

than synthetic blends—“they feel

more luxurious and look more flat-

tering”—and notes that a high-

quality design can carry you from

spring through winter. “Layer it

over a turtleneck, a pop-color knit

or...wear it with a gorgeous silk

shirt underneath,” she said, adding

that your base layer should hug

the body to avoid any unsightly,

lumpy lines. Oh, and another

thing: “We’re seeing women wear

it underneath a blazer for work—I

think it’s totally appropriate.”

On the hanger, it might look like

precious, indolent lingerie, but the

slip dress is a wardrobe workhorse.

Dress it up or down, pile on the lay-

ers or—my personal preference—

embrace some ’90s nostalgia and

wear it bare like Ms. Barrymore. As

Ms. Lotan put it, “It’s almost like

wearing nothing.” Only better.

It may resemble lingerie,

but the slip dress is a

wardrobe workhorse.