Say No to the Dress: Why Women Are Trading Gowns for Wedding Suits
Bianca Jagger stunned onlookers when she opted to wear a Yves Saint Laurent skirt suit to wed Mick in 1971—an unconventional look that’s more relevant than ever. How to conjure her subversive style.
3 min
ON MAY 12, 1971, Nicaraguan socialite Bianca Pérez-Mora Macías married Rolling Stones frontman Mick Jagger in a shotgun wedding in Saint-Tropez. (Bianca was four months pregnant with their daughter Jade.) Mr. Jagger flew in many of the estimated 75 guests on a chartered plane with only a day’s notice, and such superstars as Brigitte Bardot, Paul McCartney and Ronnie Wood attended. Although the union disintegrated after seven years, and Bianca told Vanity Fair in 1986 that “a rock star is the worst husband a woman could have,” her wedding went down in rock ’n’ roll history. Not only did she wed one of the era’s biggest heartthrobs, she shunned froufrou wedding gowns and opted for a risqué white suit by Yves Saint Laurent. The jacket exposed her bare chest; the bias-cut skirt concealed her pregnant belly; the veiled floppy hat projected a breezy sort of drama; and platform sandals punctuated the look.
While the outfit might not provoke comment now, it did then—in part because Ms. Jagger wore nothing beneath the plunging jacket. “It was really risky to not only have a jacket instead of a dress, but this huge décolleté,” said Florence Müller, an art and fashion historian who curated the 2010 exhibition “Yves Saint Laurent: The Retrospective” at Paris’s Petit Palais. Ms. Müller suggested that Ms. Jagger’s suit might have been an offshoot of the late Saint Laurent’s subversive spring 1971 couture collection. Known as “La Collection du Scandale,” it took inspiration from sex workers who frequented Paris’s Bois de Boulogne and from silhouettes popularised during the German occupation of France in the 1940s.
More than 50 years later, Ms. Jagger’s confidently unconventional suit feels newly relevant. Even before the Covid era, which upended countless couples’ wedding plans and called for less-formal celebrations, women were embracing alternatives to the prim white wedding gown. Just look at model and author Emily Ratajkowski, who cited Ms. Jagger’s wedding ensemble as an influence when she chose a mustard Zara suit and a veiled brown hat for her 2018 wedding.
In a recent 2,000-person survey by market-research agency OnePoll, one in five respondents agreed that the white wedding dress is a dated tradition. “The prospect of wearing a fluffy white dress was frankly embarrassing to me,” admitted Kaelin Goulet, 37, who works in consulting in New York. For her October 2022 wedding, Ms. Goulet enlisted Isabel Wilkinson Schor, founder of New York brand Attersee, to tailor the label’s ivory vest and matching trousers to perfection. “I wanted to be comfortable and to be able to rewear my outfit,” said Ms. Goulet. “My mom wore a white shirtdress when she and my dad wed in 1984, and I have vivid memories from my childhood of her wearing her ‘wedding dress’ to work on summer days.”
For a bridal suit, “fit is critical,” said New York stylist Micaela Erlanger. “It’s about being effortless,” she said, but there’s a difference between “relaxed elegance” and looking sloppy. Ms. Erlanger condones sets by brands including Danielle Frankel and Ralph Lauren, both of which deliver “exquisite tailoring.” New York bridal stylist Anny Choi, meanwhile, advocates looking beyond typical bridal brands, noting that New York designer Christopher John Rogers offers refreshing options. Going nontraditional, she added, doesn’t mean buying the trendiest thing off the runway. “Subtle yet impactful styling choices”—like Ms. Jagger’s decision to forgo a blouse and add a sun hat—will make the outfit, she said.
The fact that Ms. Jagger’s suit echoed her new husband’s three-piece—blurring gender lines—made it all the more memorable. “Bianca made this combination modern and sexy and really feminized [the] jacket,” which was largely reserved for men at the time, said Ms. Choi. Bicoastal gallerist Caroline Luce similarly subverted gender aesthetics in her 2020 Big Sur wedding. Ms. Luce, 37, who was originally set on a suit, found her dream bridal outfit in a black Ralph Lauren tuxedo dress. “Having my own version of a black tuxedo was a perfect balance to [my husband] Nino’s tuxedo,” said Ms. Luce. “It felt like such an elegant but understated way to enter into this next chapter of our lives—visually in tandem, side by side in simple suits.”
In her Yves Saint Laurent suit, Ms. Jagger was a woman who knew her power. Its “rebellious attitude,” Ms. Choi suggested, explains “why brides today continue to reference this look.”
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Odd Culture Group brings a new kind of after-dark energy to the CBD, where daiquiris, disco and design collide beneath the city streets.
2 min
Sydney’s nightlife has long flirted with reinvention, but its latest arrival suggests something more deliberate is taking shape beneath the surface.
Razz Room, the new underground bar and disco from Odd Culture Group, has opened in the CBD, marking the group’s first step into the city centre.
Tucked below street level on York Street, the venue blends cocktail culture with a shifting, late-night rhythm that moves from after-work drinks to full dancefloor immersion.
The space itself is designed to evolve over the course of an evening. An upper bar offers a more intimate setting, suited to early drinks and conversation, while a sunken dancefloor anchors the venue’s later hours, with a rotating program of DJs and live performances.
“Razz Room will really change shape throughout a single evening,” says Odd Culture Group CEO Rebecca Lines.
“Earlier, it’s geared towards post-work drinks with a happy hour, substantial food offering, and music at a level where you can still talk.”
As the night progresses, that tone shifts.
“As the evening progresses at Razz Room, you can expect the music to get a little louder and the focus will shift to live performance with recurring residencies and DJs that flow from disco to house, funk, and jazz,” Rebecca says.
The concept draws heavily on New York’s underground club scene before disco became mainstream, referencing venues such as The Mudd Club and Paradise Garage. But the intention is not nostalgia.
“The space told us what it wanted to be,” Lines explains. “Disco started as a counter culture… Razz Room is no nostalgia project, it’s a reimagining of the next era of the discotheque.”
Design, too, plays its part in shaping the experience. The upper level is warm and textural, with timber finishes and burnt-orange tones, while the sunken floor shifts into a more theatrical mood, combining Art Deco references with a raw, industrial edge.
Now complete, Ophora at Tallawong offers luxury finishes, 10-year defect insurance and standout value from $475,000.
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