Next inline for the list of my top ten fashion icons is a man that oozed sex appeal and took the 1950’s East of Eden. It didn’t take much clothing to get his character across; his personality is what made him the icon he is remembered for today. I’m talking about none other than James Dean.
Having watched Rebel Without A Cause over break with my best friend, I was quickly reminded how fond I was over Mr. Dean. His troubled soul, the brooding eyes, slicked back hair, with a cigarette in his mouth; it was no wonder why his popularity rose to exponential proportions.
His style was much simpler than his inner artistic being. It was clean, classic, and relatively effortless. His staples consisted of fitted dark denim jeans, none of this 2011 baggy jeans business. He is the man that helped make jeans become an essential within the wardrobe of every American living in the baby boomer age. His signature cut was the Lee 101 Riders. His other staples include a white t shirt, and a red wind breaker esk jacket (Popularized in Rebel Without a Cause). Most people automatically think leather jackets coincide with the 1950’s, but the red windbreaker is what separated the man, James Dean, from the boys.
The “It” factor that shrouded around this impressionable masculine figure, was the relate ability he had to just about every other guy out there. He was breaking the trouser and buttoned shirt mold. Rebelling against the working class drone look, and taking on the virile stature of the dressed down appearance that practically shouted, “I’m sexy and I know it.”
It seems crazy that a pair of jeans, t-shirt, and red jacket could truly alter the minds of men forever, but this was the task that James Dean was able to accomplish with complete cool and ease. With his death at the young age of 24, his unmistakable style and racy persona has captivated fashionable men for years to come.