She attributes fancy menswear's growing sales figures to the fact that many men are now experimenting more with clothes--trying on new looks at a time when the old dress-for-success rules have broken down and new rules have yet to be written.

FORBES: Making Money In Style

Writer and researcher Jone Johnson Lewis, writing on the website Women's History, has told of female resistance fighters on the Channel Islands wearing men's clothes to disguise themselves while posting flyers stirring opposition to German occupation.

BBC: Spy wear: Styling secret agents

In the cities of the rich world no woman is expected to wear a garment until it is worn out. (Men, unaccountably, tend to hold on to their clothes for years, but the industry is working on the problem.) The clothes industry would be in a pickle without a constant supply of clients dissatisfied with the contents of their wardrobes.

ECONOMIST: Bonnie Cashin

He was not a dandy and just threw on his clothes, but was one of those men who would have looked elegant standing in a mudhole.

NPR: Excerpt: 'The Prince of Frogtown'

By the '90s, flat-front pants had returned, catching on more fully in 1999, when the broader use of stretchy material in men's clothes attracted more men to the style.

WSJ: The Pleats Plea: Wear These