La Fashion Style: Madonna

Rooney Mara as Lisbeth Salander in W Magazine

I'm loving the androgynous trend this Winter. There's something sexy about a woman in a man-style suit - a fitted black suit with a white shirt and skinny black tie. The girls dressing as boys trend seemed to start with Marlene Dietrich shocking the world with her man style suits in the 1930's, and then gathered momentum in 1966 with YSL launching his Le Smoking jacket (below, shot by Helmut Newton).

Just look at Bianca Jagger (below) when she married Mick Jagger in that amazing white YSL fitted suit, sans shirt. Diane Keaton launched a massive trend with her Annie Hall look in the 70's and model and Chanel muse Inès de la Fressange.

Inès (below) has mastered boyish yet sexy gamine look. One of her style icons is Katherine Hepburn " or simply somebody that looks comfortable. Anyone who wears men's clothes and looks feminine is also very stylish."

I also loved k.d Land & Cindy Crawford's 1993 Vanity Fair cover. Sexy androgynous cool.

I have long been a fan of Karen Walkers' black trousers, particularly after Madonna rocked them out at the 1998 MTV Awards (below). Karen's masculine-feminine aesthetic is a recurring theme and she works it to perfection.

Madonna in Helmut Lang tank & Karen Walker wool trousers

There seem to be many a 'Lisbeth Salander' type look on the catwalk and in editorials, plus a wave of celebs are rocking the showcasing man-style look, from boy style like Evan Rachel Wood and Brit-packers Keira Knightly, Alice Dellal & Coco Sumner (aka Sting's model musician daughter), total androgyny like Tilda Swinton, Stella Tennant and Kristen McMenamy, to smouldering sexy looks like Victoria Beckham, Lake Bell and Helena Christensen. And tehn there's Alexa Chung, who experiments with both gamine and sexy suity looks. Here are some latest boy/man style looks below from celebs on the street plus some of the latest collections and editorials.

Kate Moss

Victoria Beckham

Helena Christensen in Hedi Slimane with Hedi Slimane

Camille Belle in Tom Ford, 2011

Lake Bell

Kate Bosworth

Leighton Meester rocking man style suits

Evan Rachel Wood

Alexa Chung

Coco Sumner

Alice Dellal

Freja Beha Erichsen

Rooney Mara as Lisbeth Salander in W Magazine

Tilda Swinton for W Ma g, August 2011

Giselle of Vogue China

Stella Tennant for Vogue UK, July 2011

Kristen McMenamy, Vogue UK August 2010

Tom Ford Collection, 2011

Nielsen Social Media Report 2009-2010

Dolce & Gabbana Fall 2011

Zadig & Voltaire, Winter 2012

YSL

Jean Paul Gaultier Spring 2011

Andrej Pejic for Jean Paul Gaultier 2011

Feja Beha Erichsen for Chanel RTW Fall 2011

Abbey Lee for Chanel RTW Fall 2011

Ever since I tied lace bows in my hair Madonna-style as a kid in the 80's, I've loved lace. Love these pics of Anna Della Russo, Editor at large and creative consultant for Vogue Japan, in her Dolce & Gabbana beautiful lace sheath dress.

Anna Dello Russo in Dolce & Gabbana

Lace seems to come around every few years and has been hot in 2010 and 2011. I love that lace can go from ladylike, preppy or Royal Wedding-prim to dark, gothic and cool. I summise that the trend may have been given a nudge along by the fabulous show Downton Abbey set in England in 1912 - all Edwardian lace, tightly bound corsets and rows of pearl buttons.

Lady Mary in lace and jet choker

Lady Mary's choker also seen on Monica Bellucci in a 2001 horror

Miss Havisham in Great Expectations has long been a favourite character and fashion inspiration of mine. She is a tragic, wealthy woman who was left at the alter. She rattles around her dilapidated mansion Statis House still wearing her faded Victorian style lace wedding dress, in mourning of her predicament. She is surrounded by the crumbling decays of the long forgotten wedding cake & banquet, cobwebs sweeping from decrepit, dust-riddled chandeliers and candelabras. It's all fabulously tormented and gothic!

I recently watched the fantastic 1998 version with Ethan Hawke and Gwyneth Paltrow - beautiful. Gwyneth is the perfect icy cool Estella, Francisco Clements artwork features but Anne Bancroft's crazy-as-a-cut-snake Miss Havisham character Ms Dinsmoor is gold! For her Fall 2011 line, Georgina Chapman from Marchesa channels Miss Havisham with distressed wedding dresses and frothy lace affairs: “I love the decaying opulence,” Chapman said. “We just thought, its so Marchesa."

"Yes, Miss Havisham regrets to inform you she has inspired another designer. It was evident from the raw hems of their gowns, the corsetry and the numerous deflated veils, that Ms. Chapman and Ms. Craig had that character in mind. Some of the fabrics were shown with zigzag edges shorn by a pair of fabric scissors. Ignoring the theme, these were actually quite imaginative designs, intriguing because they are so unlike the examples of stiff, origami-like constructions that are Marchesa signatures". From the New York Times:

Marchesa Fall 2011

I am obsessed with this gorgeous lace dress from Aussie label Lover. Lara Bingle models it for Aussie Grazia magazine, and Harper's Bazaar Christine Centenera also wears it below.

Black dress by Lover

Marc Jacobs and Dolce & Gabbana lace dresses in US Vogue

Katie Holmes for Vogue Spain

Madonna had long been a devotee of Dolce & Gabbana and she looks fabulous in lace in this shoot for Fall 2010. Photographed by Steven Klein, the shoot was inspired by Italian Neorealist cinema and featured Madonna as a sultry Fellini style Italian housewife in the tradition of Anita Eckberg's platinum femme fatale.

Madonna in Dolce & Gabbana with Lourdes, 2011

Pearl Lowe's label designs some beautiful lace dresses. Pearl uses antique lace, sourced from vintage outlets and custom dyed. She is inspired by "Things like antique markets and shops, vintage fairs, old fashioned movies, things from the past. Daisy is my muse, because she is what I would love to look like in my clothes. Sadly, I can't always wear the things I create."