“She’s ’90s and 2000s Calvin Klein archive, Dolce & Gabbana, and Ralph Lauren,” 22-year-old Paris-based fashion student Asia Bieuville says in a TikTok. “She’s the office siren.” As her video goes on, a picture of this hypothetical woman and her immediately recognisable but formerly nameless aesthetic begins to form. “She wears bold lips and bold nails, chunky jewellery that makes a statement, but simple outfits,” Bieuville continues, name-dropping Bayonetta glasses, thigh-high socks, and Elsa Peretti jewellery. “She’s everything we aspire to be this year,” she says. And she’s not wrong. Looking at the green-screened collage behind her—which features Bella Hadid in a black pencil skirt set from Tom Ford’s S/S 98 collection for Gucci; Gisele Bündchen walking the runway in a turtleneck sweater, croc-print skirt, and stiletto knee-highs at Ralph Lauren’s A/W 00 show; and Chanel’s beloved and forever-sold-out Oiseau de Nuit nail colour—it’s clear that the office-siren look is exactly the one every brand and fashion girl is striving to achieve in 2024.
“I began to see the influences of this trend in the F/W 22 shows, where we were starting to move away from ‘fuzziness’ and back towards something more structured,” she explains over email. After spotting video after video surrounding back-to-office shopping and dressing on her TikTok feed at the start of the season, similar to the way we were once inundated with back-to-school fashion content, the trend and its now-viral name sort of just clicked in her head. “I think it’s the natural evolution of a generation that has gone from [one to the other],” she says, from school to work. According to Bieuville, the trend is all about challenging feminine energy in the office, a space that’s so often male-dominated. “We’ve often been told that women have to adapt to masculine codes to be respected and admired in the corporate world, but I think there’s another, more sensual and stylish way,” she explains. “The woman who represents this has ambition, likes to assume her sensuality and femininity, and doesn’t care about judgment. She proves herself through her actions. She’s Samantha Jones in Sex and the City: feminine, sexy, and successful.”
Though the office siren’s closet is made up of primarily vintage pieces and archival runway looks by the aforementioned designers and more, Bieuville says that today’s creative directors who are adopting this trend right and left and thus adapting it for the modern woman are just as qualified to fill up her wardrobe. “Miu Miu’s F/W 23 collection is what lit the office-siren flame in me,” she says of the librarian-chic offering designed by Miuccia Prada that debuted in February. “More recently, Gucci’s Ancora collection and Peter Hawkings’ debut collection for Tom Ford fit perfectly with what I imagine this woman wearing.” For her, there’s a clear through line from these two recent collections to Tom Ford’s original designs for Gucci from the ’90s and 2000s, which act as a strong foundation for this trend. But let’s be clear: This aesthetic is present in plenty more collections from the past few seasons, including Ferragamo’s most recent offerings by Creative Director Maximilian Davis and Anthony Vaccarello’s for Saint Laurent.
As many dos as the office-siren look has—Bone Cuffs, slinky blouses, pencil skirts, stilettos, and cherry red—it likewise has its don’ts, Bieuville shares. One common misconception when it comes to the trend is that it’s vulgar, especially for an office setting. “A big ‘don’t’ for me would be to be inappropriately dressed,” she says. “The corporate side is still very much present, but [the office siren] lifts it all up with a play on materials, and in the end it’s quite a subtle balance.” Putting an emphasis on the word subtle, she says that ending up in anything leopard print with patent-leather stilettos is a sign you’ve gone way too far. “The aim is not to be noticed only for your looks, but to shine with all your qualities.” Really, it’s more about the woman than her closet. Though, when someone has themself fully figured out, they usually also have a good grasp on their personal style. And the office siren is 100% the type to know exactly who she is and what she wants—from her job, from her style, from her life as a whole. Be the office siren this fall and winter by shopping the selection below.
This story originally appeared on Who What Wear U.S.
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