If Kendall Jenner has any idea why it’s so sacrilege to show your knickers, well, she just doesn’t care about it, as the model wore a See-PL dress to London’s Fashion Awards.
What does See-PL mean? It’s panty line that you're meant to see. It's a bit like VPL, except rather than negatively worn, where the wearer’s undercrackers are visible in a way they're not meant to be, they’re worn with the goal of being seen, deliberately looked at and adored, almost as much as the sheer dress they’re seen through.
Kendall's sheer dress was a gold one by Julien MacDonald, and as she arrived at the Fashion Awards in the Royal Albert Hall, she unabashedly let the world take note of the amazing fact that she was wearing knickers! And sure, sure, the back of the outfit showed that Kendall’s bum wasn’t hoisted into pants but divided by a thin strip of thong, but still, See-PL was definitely there.
VPL - or visible panty liner - has long been used to shame women, to suggest that your panty liner is visible in a way that confounds expectations in only a bad way, but Kendall’s shown that showing your pants, in a way where they’re not just visible, but deliberately demanding to be seen can be so much more interesting. And warm, we'd wager.
It’s not the first time Kendall’s done the See-PL either, as she attended a Chopard event at Cannes 2018 this summer dressed in a green chainmail dress by Alexandre Vauthier, with her boobs out but, crucially, her pants on. She did this twice more at Cannes, in her red carpet appearances. First off, she wore a white Giambattista Valli gown with big, wide beige pants on, and then there was the black velvet Roberto Cavalli number she donned, featuring high-legged black briefs.
Sales of thongs have dropped over the past few years, as women have ditched them and other such devices dedicated to ensuring that the shocking truth - women wear underwear - is concealed, in favour of things like ease and comfort.
And while Kendall has kind of given thongs - and her bumcheeks - a lot more airtime than is truly necessary (as the old joke goes: how do you know you’ve got washing to do? The only clean underwear you have left is a thong), what’s encouraging is that, from the front, her pants really can be seen.
For a woman who models for Calvin Klein, it certainly makes sense to wear some great big pants when walking the red carpet, but, there’s something oddly - and uniquely - relatable about the fact Kendall seems to prefer wearing knickers to, well, wearing none! Knicker-wearing is hardly feminism’s biggest or most important bastion, and feminism is also about the choice to use cotton as bumfloss, should any woman so wish. But it’s quite warming, literally, that Kendall’s gone for comfort, and that she’s helped make See-PL such a thing.