Fashion: They name it, you wear it

HOT PANTS, Flares and Belly-Button not only describe club fashion right now, but are also the names of some of the funkiest clubs in town, writes Emma Goodman.

It seems that every other band is named after a fabric - Suede, Denim, Silk, Corduroy - and now the club scene is following a similar trend, with one-night clubs where you don't have to fret about what to wear, because the name tells you.

So tonight, it is off to Hot Pants, where turning up in shorty-shorts gets you in free. But note, 'hot pants' these days means teeny 'crotchy' shorts, not the old style with turn-ups and a bib. The promotor, Sav, says the club is for people 'who are serious about their music'.

Flares, on Saturday nights, is for those into boogying. The promoter, Jer Koozie, warns: 'The faders drop on your favourite choruses, so remember to learn your lines.' Free percussion shakers are given to the first 100 clubbers to arrive.

Belly-Button was launched last Saturday, amid the gyrating of bare midriffs to garage music. Only those brave enough to bare their navels should show up in future, although Boy George, who chooses some of the music, is allowed to be an exception.

Clubs, like fashions, come and go. You've already missed Cleavage, the hot club when the Gossard Wonderbra made underwear into outerwear and provoked fever-pitch sales.

You've also missed Toile, a one-off club hosted yesterday at the Cafe de Paris, London, by Central St Martin's fashion students. A 'toile' is a proof made of calico before a garment is cut from expensive cloth. But nobody turned up to Toile looking like a pattern piece.

Hot Pants is at Shuffles, 3-5 Rathbone Place, London W1, 10pm-3am Thursdays. Free if you are wearing hot pants, pounds 5 if not. Flares is in Ruby's Dance Club, 49 Carnaby Street, W1, 10pm-late Saturdays; pounds 8 non-members, pounds 6 members. No concessions for wearing flares - you'll just feel left out if you are not. Belly-Button is at RAW/YMCA, 112a Great Russell Street, WC1, 10pm-3.30am Saturday; pounds 8 admission whether or not you show the doorman your navel.

(Photograph omitted)