Tight-fitting, stretchy leg garments that extend from waist to ankle—a category of clothing whose journey from sportswear to streetwear to luxury fashion has been one of the most rapid and complete in modern dress history.
Leggings began as athletic wear—wool or cotton knits worn by men for warmth and freedom of movement. In the 1960s and 1970s, they were adopted by dancers and aerobics enthusiasts, worn under leotards and leg warmers. The fabric was typically a cotton-spandex blend that offered compression and recovery.
Leggings are a study in the erosion of boundaries: between private and public, between active and passive, between dressing for oneself and dressing for others. They are the garment that asks the question: if no one can see the difference between my leggings and my tights, does the distinction matter? And in asking, they have redrawn the map of what counts as dressed.
