Women & Men:
A Fashion Love Story
When the idea of devoting our fall fashion issue to the way women and men relate through clothes came up, we thought, Why not? The male-female dynamic is only the most perplexing relationship in our culture, one that several millennia of artists, poets, musicians, and psychiatrists have failed to help us fully comprehend. And, just to reach a little bit further, why not (for the first time) address men’s fashion directly, with a vice versa issue that would put the two genders in opposition (and bring the production department to tears)?
Fashion is a remarkably direct map of human sexual behavior. How we dress broadcasts our most intimate individual desires; come here, touch me, back off. This fall, those messages are delivered via fluttery little dresses, voluminous lush knits, a rethinking of the power suit (softer, but no less impressive), and—proof that the genders can happily co-exist—clothes and clothing styles stolen straight from the closet of the opposite sex.
And then there are love stories. This issue is full of them, from casual street flirtations to the tender passion of a young couple dawdling in the park. But too many happy endings and you’d think you were in Hollywood. So in a story that opens both sides of this fashion flip book, we cast Oscar winner Rachel Weisz and actor-director Justin Theroux as a couple struggling in a rocky marriage. It’s the darker side of male-female relations: They fight, they part, they reconcile (inconclusively). On this side, you’ll see one day from her point of view; flip the magazine over for his. Can it work? Will they stay together? Who knows? But they look fantastic.
Slide Shows:
Her Side of the Story
Scenes from a marriage on a split screen, starring Rachel Weisz and Justin Theroux. Photographs by Serge Leblon
Honey, Can I Borrow This?
Raiding his closet. Photographs by Sam Haskins
To Have and to Hold
Bring out the rings and things. Photographs by Marilyn Minter
If Sunday Could Last Forever
A walk in the park. Photographs by Jock Sturges
Watching the Girls Go By
How to turn heads. Photographs by Oliviero Toscani Next: Men’s Fall Fashion