Feminine style icons of the 70s

Women who changed the world - and inspired Högl

It’s the influential personalities that bring an age to life. In the 70s, women like Bian-ca Jagger, Brigitte Bardot and Cher embodied everything the decade stood for.

Every decade tells its own story and has its own particular style. In the 70s it was all about women who wanted to be more than mothers and housewives. They wanted to step into the spotlight, find their own niche in the world and lead their own self-reliant lives, regardless of outdated role models. Some of them became well known for just these ambitions, and still are today, They have even been elevated to style icons.

The Högl Autumn/Winter collection is dedicated to today’s modern, stylish and influential women. It is aimed at all the women out there who make a success of their daily lives, while still exuding beauty and self-assurance. Because shoes can determine our attitude to life. They emphasise personality, giving everyone an individual and unique appearance, and also granting each woman the self-assurance they need to stride out on their own two feet.

We’d like to introduce you to three women who have all influenced the world with their self-determined, confident demeanour.

Bianca Jagger – once a rock star’s wife and it girl, now an activist 

Her name conjures images of the hottest party girl from the vast metropolis that was 70s New York. Photos like the one of her riding a white house through the famous Studio 54 nightclub on her 27th birthday went all around the world. Disco was the epitome of excess and extrava-gance and Bianca Jagger was the queen of this glamorous world.

 

Bianca Jagger actually had a very traditional Catholic upbringing and her original ambition was to become a nun. She was born in the Nicaraguan capital Managua in 1950 and from a young age she was involved in campaigning on social and political issues.

Aged 20, her life changed overnight when she was introduced to Mick Jagger in 1970 at a party after a Rolling Stones concert. One year later, she was pregnant and the couple married in Saint-Tropez, plunging Bianca Jagger into the public eye. The wedding was certainly a spectacle. Superstars including Paul McCartney and Eric Clapton flew there in private jets and the fishing village’s narrow alleyways teemed with celebrities. Instead of a traditional wedding dress, Bianca Jagger wore a tuxedo jacket, skirt and hat, all by Yves Saint Laurent. From then on, she became a style icon and was a muse for both the designer Halston and the artist Andy Warhol.

The years that followed were stormy and not particularly happy and Bianca Jagger filed for divorce in 1978. Today, she campaigns for human rights and environmentalism and travels to crisis areas for Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch or her own foundation.

Brigitte Bardot – sex symbol, scandalous figure and style icon

Even today, Brigitte Bardot is the epitome of sensuality and self-reliant femininity. She creat-ed a new image of womankind through her film roles in the 60s and 70s and her public appearances. All of a sudden, femininity became sexy and self-assured. She unashamedly revealed her perfect body in films such as And God Created Woman, The Truth and Viva Maria! and became the most photographed woman in the world. The fashion world was soon unable to talk about anything other than the French girl “BB”, about her lascivious blonde beehive, her cats’ eyes outlined in black eyeliner and her weakness for bikinis, which became an indispensable item on the fashion scene.

Until the abrupt end to her acting career, she led a glamorous jet-set lifestyle. She made countless scandalous appearances on the Côte d’Azur with her third husband, the then playboy Gunter Sachs. It was Sachs who arranged for 1000 roses to be scattered from a helicop-ter over her house when they got engaged in Saint-Tropez in 1966. This passionate marriage lasted three years.

From one extreme to another, she made the decision to withdraw from public life in 1973. Her farewell was a dramatic and definitive move. Today, Brigitte Bardot lives as a recluse with her fourth husband, her dogs and horses in Saint-Tropez, dedicating herself completely to animal welfare.

Cher – pop star, disco diva and queen of boho

She’s worn practically every look under the sun and embodied every style. From Egyptian goddess through rock chick and right up to Indian boho style, Cher has lived her life in the spotlight, in outfits for the world’s stage. Just as often as she has reinvented herself musically in her career, she has also revamped her fashion style. Her legendary stage outfits, dripping with glitter and sequins and made from as little fabric as possible, still shape fashion today.

But she’s also always been bursting with self-assured extravagance during her public appear-ances. Whether with long, sleek, black hair or bouncy curls, dressed cowgirl-style or in one of her see-through dresses, her look was always accompanied by her flawless complexion, her characteristic cheekbones and smoky eyes. In no time she became not only a fashion icon but also a role model for women who wanted to set their own course and achieve their own goals. She defined style for decades, she made the cover of Vogue six times and, in 1999, she was awarded the “Fashion Oscar” for her influence on the world of fashion.

As a pop icon, she also made her mark on musical genres such as folk, disco and electropop; as an Oscar, Emmy, Grammy and three-times Golden Globe winner, she can rightfully claim the title of “most successful solo artist of all time”. This “goddess of pop” can also look back on an equally successful acting career. After first earning critical acclaim for her film roles in Silkwood and The Mask, she won the 1988 Oscar for Best Actress in Moonstruck.

 

There are many ways to express your personality. Fashion is just one of them and shoes can often tell a story of their very own. There are as many different types of shoes are there are women, so let yourself be led by your feelings as you browse the new Autumn/Winter collection in our online store and you’re sure to find a style that makes you feel like a style icon!