When I was little, my favourite outfit wasn’t a dress or a pair of jeans. It was a pair of striped Scandinavian overalls — slightly too big, the straps crossing clumsily at the back, the knees already fading from adventures. I don’t remember the brand, only the feeling: freedom, movement, a kind of gentle protection. They were my armour and my playground all at once.
Years later, I realise I never really stopped wearing them. The silhouette has evolved — now it’s oversized vintage denim, sometimes a size too big on purpose — but the comfort, the ease, the quiet confidence remain. I wear them almost daily at home, through every season. They make me feel effortlessly me — dressed but unpretentious, grounded yet ready for anything. Overalls, to me, are what other people find in a perfect white shirt or an old leather jacket: familiarity, freedom, and the sense that you can just get on with life.
A humble beginning, a lasting legacy
The story of the overall began far from fashion — somewhere between dust, wood, and labour. In 19th-century Lyon, a tailor named Louis Lafont stitched a bib onto a pair of trousers for his carpenter father, so he could keep his tools close. Across the ocean, Levi Strauss and Jacob Davis were experimenting with denim, rivets, and practicality. These garments weren’t about aesthetics — they were about endurance. But like all good design stories, function soon found its way to form.
By the time American youth discovered denim as rebellion, the overall had quietly slipped from factory floors to festival fields. The ‘70s made it a statement of liberation; the ‘90s gave it slouchy attitude; and today, it has become something rarer — timeless.
Oversized, undone, and utterly free
There’s a kind of poetry in drowning a little in your clothes. Oversized overalls carry a laid-back energy that I adore. They feel both nostalgic and modern — a soft echo of Gwen Stefani’s ‘90s swagger mixed with the ease of contemporary street style.
I like to wear mine with a cashmere sweater in winter, boots sturdy enough to walk anywhere. The volume speaks for itself; it doesn’t ask for perfection. A hat, a necklace, or nothing at all — that’s the beauty of it. In a world obsessed with “put-together,” the overall whispers something different: that confidence can be comfortable, and style can be quiet.
Tailored, feminine, and unexpectedly elegant
Then there’s the fitted version — the one that nods to the ‘70s and flirts with the idea of glamour. Think Alexa Chung in dark denim, Sienna Miller layered over a turtleneck, Winona Ryder in her nonchalant way. The lines are softer, the waist defined, the silhouette more refined — a piece that says, I’m wearing overalls, but I could walk into a meeting or a gallery opening just like this.
It’s that duality I love: practical yet poised, playful yet structured. Because overalls, at their core, are about freedom — not choosing between comfort and elegance, but finding your balance in both.
Reimagined by the avant-garde
Few garments have travelled as far creatively. Japanese designers like Rei Kawakubo and Yohji Yamamoto treat overalls as blank canvases — reshaping them in wool, linen, even technical fabrics; detaching bibs, exaggerating straps, layering asymmetries. Each version feels like a conversation between discipline and abandon.
Meanwhile, brands like Visvim, Kapital and Needles reinvent them through craft — boro patchwork, sashiko stitching, hand-dyed indigo — transforming workwear into wearable art. On runways from Acne Studios to Longchamp, from Tibi to Isabel Marant, the overall keeps returning, stubbornly relevant, always reinvented.
It’s as if designers can’t resist its honesty. It’s a garment without pretence — and in fashion, that’s almost radical.
Why I’ll never call them basic
I think the reason I love overalls so deeply is that they refuse to choose sides. They’re functional but emotional, nostalgic but forward-looking, ordinary yet quietly subversive. They free you from matching, from trying too hard. They move with you, not against you.
Every time I slip into mine, I feel a small echo of that childhood version of myself — carefree, curious, completely at ease. Maybe that’s why I still reach for them, even after decades spent thinking about style and identity.
Because if style is about expressing who you are, then overalls are my truest expression: uncomplicated, enduring, a little oversized, and not so basic after all.
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