Scoli-oops-is! Vintage Finds for Good Posture

Rachel Hodin
Apr 4, 2024
5 min read

Updated: Nov 24, 2024

Welcome to Wear Mail by Rachel Hodin. Home to spectacular, shoppable finds—fed to you in tasty, bite-sized edits that'll inspire you creatively, generate lols, and are specifically designed to tickle all. Read Rachel's vintage shopping column here or subscribe on Substack.

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Out of my closest friends, I was the first to hit puberty. I then sprouted seven inches in 12 months—something that neither I, nor anyone else, could ignore, hovering as I was a good foot above all my gal pals. I was 11 years old, 5’6”, a ball of firing hormones and raw nerves, and with the child-bearing hips of a middle-aged accountant. It was all incredibly disorienting and interminably uncomfortable.

And so, with nary a Pilates reformer in sight (it would be another decade before I even learned what this was, if you can believe it!), I followed my sharp-as-a-butter-knife instincts and I hunched. I hunched and, when standing, simultaneously sat on one hip in an attempt to shave as many inches as possible off my ogre height.

Now, I’ve read my fair share of stories by women who hunched as young girls themselves; Vogue has published quite a few. Yet where these women always eventually snapped out of it, shook the bad habit, and straightened up just in time to avoid incurring lasting damage, I stuck with it—and in doing so, gave myself scoliosis. Call me what you will, but I am nothing if not perseverant.

In The Lost Art of Dress, the “Dress Doctors”—a group of women in the first half of the 19th century who made it their life’s work to school women on dressing well—are quoted as saying, “Standing erect ‘not only conveys an idea of courage to the observer, but literally tends to curtail despondency and banish fear in the individual who bears himself in that manner.’” In other words, good posture begets high self-esteem and self-worth. It follows the same line of thinking as The Secret: if you can embody success, if you can feel that surge of euphoria or relief that comes with great success, if you ARE that successful person, then you can will it into existence. Sort of like the fake-it-til-you-make-it principle.

As someone whose terrible posture is a direct consequence of low self-esteem, this philosophy appeals to me deeply. But how to assume perfect posture—and thus reap its ego-boosting benefits—if you’ve already fucked up your back 12 times to Tuesday?

Luckily there are some incredibly chic pieces out there that encourage the “proudest posture” (bosom size be damned). If you’re looking for something with a warranty on it, you’ll have more luck on Alibaba.

Among Cristobal Balenciaga’s many strong suits was his gift for shaping, altering, and enhancing the figure with exacting cuts and body-sculpting silhouettes—so much so that Demna Gvasalia (the house’s current creative director) likened him to a plastic surgeon. Nowhere was this more prominent than in his couture work, the transformative powers of which he apparently relished. Which is why, according to his biographer Mary Blume, he preferred to design couture for women, as opposed to girls. And not just any old woman, but rather “small, plump, and middle-aged” women. Apparently, “’Monsieur likes a bit of a belly’ was the saying in the house.” Monsieur also, it seems, liked a dramatic reveal.

Helmut Lang, it turns out, is another dab hand at posture-correcting pieces that are as chic as Balenciaga couture—just modern, more wearable, and infinitely more affordable.

I can’t speak to Peter Do’s Helmut Lang as I have yet to try it on, but I know this is the case for pieces designed by the eponymous designer himself, particularly during the mid-to-late-’90s, when his brand was the apex of cool. Cathy Horyn put it best when she wrote in her 1995 Vanity Fair profile on the famously reclusive designer, “Lang knows that minimalism without a rush of sin is just parochial.”

Alternately referred to as the “New Glamour” and “counter-couture,” his aesthetic during this era was defined by subtle sex appeal and club wear-inspired subversion, unconventional fabrics, and an effortless simplicity. It was also defined by specific design details that force the wearer to stand up a little straighter. These include fabric and gauzy sashes wrapped around the neck, chest, or bodice like an elegant, bondage-y harness and, most typically, a marriage of slim-cut sleeves, narrow shoulders, and extra-high armholes.

You see what I’m talking about here, yes?

These latter details are all present in his now-iconic “slashed” tops that debuted in Fall/Winter ‘93 and feature skinny two-piece sleeves separated by slashes at the inner elbows. When worn, the overall effect of such cuts and fits is like a hard poke between the shoulder blades. It’s as if someone were behind you pulling the shoulders back, lifting the sternum, and snapping your posture into place.

Once again, Cathy Horyn put it best in that same Vanity Fair profile: “[William] Mullen, [Lang’s friend and a former creative director of Details]…thinks that what separates Lang from other minimalists, notably Prada and Jil Sander, is the ‘idiosyncrasies of his fit.’ A Lang jacket cups you under the arms and squeezes you from the back. It almost makes you feel a little brazen, as if you were wearing a terribly naughty leather-shop harness instead of a jacket.”

Below, a selection of some of the best posture-correcting vintage Helmut Lang currently available (with links in the captions).