Make way for madras: Again, it's all the rage


Rachel Bilson's wearing it. Jessica Simpson sports it. Heck, even Ashton Kutcher dons the funky plaid that's making a huge fashion comeback. Madras, a lightweight, bright fabric that screams summer, is huge in Hollywood and is creeping into catalogs and clothing stores.

"You've got great celebrities running around in madras shorts and tops," says Tara Kraft, the fashion expert at Star magazine. When Hollywood hotties sport a fashion, you know it's popular, she says.

Old Navy is encouraging you to crave madras with its "Make it Madras" campaign, and online sales of madras on trend-barometer eBay increased more than 70 percent between May and June.

Melissa Moylan, an editor at FashionSnoops, a trend forecasting company and a fashion consultant in New York, says the hot summer style is back even bigger this year because the casual look is booming.

"Because culture today is so casual, there was a demand for something cool and fun with less structure," Moylan noted by e-mail. "Madras fits right in with that demand, so it has become readily available."

This fun fabric is named for the city in India where it was first woven. Introduced to the United States in the 1930s, it didn't become really popular until the 1950s and 1960s.

To create breathability, madras is made of loosely woven cotton threads in bright colors, including pinks, blues and greens. The weave creates a plaid patchwork of extremely soft material that hangs away from the body to prevent uncomfortable clinging.

In its heyday, madras was known for its running dyes. Every time the madras was washed the colors would run, creating a unique washed-out look, known as bleeding madras.

The look was extremely fashionable, but there was a fine line between hip and way too washed out. Hipsters from the 1950s and 1960s knew exactly how many times they could wash their madras before it became too faded and tragically unhip, meeting an untimely end in the garbage.

Today, madras dyes no longer run, so the washed-out look that was once so popular has become a thing of the past. But besides the death of bleeding, not much has changed in the style's resurrection. The basic patterns and color schemes are similar to the older style. Maine-based madras wholesaler Jenna Sisselman even sells a color scheme identical to one sold in the 1950s and 1960s.

Original madras, woven in India, can be found in smaller boutiques and online. Because of the labor involved in the manufacturing process, traditional madras sells to upwards of $80.

But with the resurrection of madras also came an updated, cheaper version of the original. Instead of the expensive, hand-woven Indian fabric, madras look-alikes are created by printing a madras plaid pattern on cotton to create a comparable look. This is the style most often found in malls and department stores.

"The print hasn't really changed that much," says Andrea Lui, the brand manager at Old Navy.

What's changed, she says is "where you're seeing it."

"Back in the day, it was the men who wore the madras shorts or jackets. Today, you're seeing it in skirts and things that women can wear too. It's not really the madras that's changed, but the product and the styling and what we're putting the print on that's changing."

So what makes madras a better summer staple than your trusty pair of jean shorts?

"It's a cotton so it's light weight," Lui says. "It's just a summer type of happy -- brighter, cleaner colors."

"It's the most comfortable clothing you will ever put on," Sisselman says. "It's the best warm-weather fabric out there. It's light and breathes. It feels like you're wearing pajamas."

The fabric also calls to mind a casual, preppy style reminiscent of days spent playing a round of golf or lounging poolside.

"Madras represents a lifestyle," Sisselman says. "Even if you can't be on vacation, you're out to look and feel like you are. People are looking for something fun and bright and relaxing."

Lui agrees: "In summer you do more of those activities that you relate to preppiness like golfing and tennis. It's a great way to show off the print in all those summer activities."

It's clear with madras' breathability and fun, flirty look that it is the ideal summer fabric, and it's true that madras is popular every summer, especially with the preppier crowd. This summer, though, the style has exploded. More people want to get into the look and embrace the preppy style.

This is the time to see the madras trend in full bloom, FashionSnoops' Moylan says.

"It's something you will definitely see at summer events like pool parties. From a mother wearing a madras dress to golfer dads wearing a belt and the Abercrombie crowd taking this trend to the fullest, it's something that is preppy cool for the masses. Madras is popular ... as it's a large-scale trend that many people could embrace regardless of age and gender."

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Here's how to wear madras

If you want to try out madras but are a bit intimidated by the bright colors and unique look it creates, fashion experts offer this advice on how to ease into the style:

- Anyone can wear madras, regardless of age and gender.

- Madras is a summer look and shouldn't be worn in the fall.

- Madras is meant to look casual, but pulled together. It's probably best not to wear it to the office.

- Wear it loose. It should hang away from your body, not cling to it.

- Don't wear it from head to toe. Pick either a top or bottoms and pair it with something more subdued, like a solid T-shirt.

- Madras shirts look great with jeans.

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