The comeback of the cape in women's fashion

(ANSA) - Rome, November 23 - The cape is making a comeback in women's fashion this winter season.
    It comes paired with the season's other styles, from soft silhouettes that recall the 1980s to longuette dresses, ample knee-length skirts and wide-leg trousers.
    The mantle or cape has been a wardrobe classic since Medieval days and the times of the French Musketeers, but this season it is embellished with fringes and decorations and paired with cuissardes, also a remnant of the chivalrous 14th-century days when Britain's Order of the Garter was first founded.
    Some of this season's capes also have an ethnic twist, coming in the form of a practical wool or cashmere poncho that can ably substitute a jumper.
    The "golden age" of capes and mantles began on last year's runways, and the big fashion houses are bringing them back this season in their signature styles.
    Over the years, the cape has made appearances on stage in the early 1900s with dancer Isadora Duncan and legendary spy Mata Hari, and graced the shoulders of the Beatles in the 60s, who paired short, jaunty capes from flea markets with Savile Row suits.
    The cape is also multicultural, dwelling in an aesthetic mixing pot that includes Africa's burnus and Moroccan djellaba robes, the caftans of the Orient, and the Turkish dolman, before reaching Europe in a constant creative exchange that over the centuries has created the cape's exotic mystique.
    Re-imagined by the designers, the cape and mantle take on ever-changing forms this season.
    Hedi Slimane for Saint Laurent offers a cape that's more like an ethnic-flavored poncho.
    Chiuri and Piccioli dreamed up regal cloaks that have become iconic pieces from their fairytale like high fashion collection.
    Valentino's statuesque women wear a look that's more like a 15th-century Madonna, with colored velvets and silks reminiscent of the most well-known Renaissance paintings.
    Dolce & Gabbana offer up a short cape, delicately embroidered with golden thread.
    Schneiders Salzburg keeps a formal unisex line in the one cape of its Fall Winter 2015-2016 collection, reviving the garment's historical roots.
    Burberry's cape has a military feel, while Etro's is embellished with fringes, and Cos offers up a short, billowing cape in a double fabric.