Welcome to riotwear.com - Information on Affordable Sexy Maternity Clothing

It's all about showing off one's pregnant belly.

That's how Cynthia Aronovitz saw it as she posed in a bandeau top and low hip hugger pants for her pregnancy photos on North Avenue Beach.

Some people stared; others saluted.

"Just because you are pregnant doesn't mean you can't still be sexy," says Arono-vitz, a former Chicago model and the expectant mother of twins in July. "I am not afraid to show off my belly. If I have on a tight T-shirt and I am showing a little skin, that's great."

She's not alone. More and more expectant moms, especially celebrities, don't mind letting their round stomachs poke out from sheer, tight-fitting or midriff tops and slinky dresses.

Singer Brandy, who just delivered her baby girl on June 16, appears in the July issue of O magazine with a yellow crochet top, her belly peaking through.

At the VH1 Divas Las Vegas event, Dixie Chick Emily Robinson shows off her expanding stomach in a form hugging beaded number. And Internet star/model Cindy Margolis bares all in a publicity shot, taken during her eighth month, prior to birth of son Nicholas Issac earlier this month.

"There's been a revolution in the maternity market," proclaims Liz Lange, New York-based maternity wear designer to the stars. (She has dressed Tea Leoni and Vanessa L. Williams and now Sarah Jessica Parker.) "Women said, "I am not going to wear the oversize dress. I am not going to change my fashion sense for nine months. Your stomach is changing, but your taste level and your eye are not."

But the pickings are slim in the maternity market, says Kate Huff, 29, of Evanston.

She searched endlessly among the flower and bow varieties for a fashionable maternity dress to wear to weddings.

Her choice: A black bias-cut matte jersey dress with decolletage and leather straps. (She accessorizes it with platform shoes and a black beaded choker.)

"If you can be sexy and pregnant, it helps you feel better about your body changing," she says. "It helps your outlook."

Roxanne Beckford Hoge, co-owner of the maternity and nursing clothing Web site onehotmama.com, makes sure she offers her clients flattering clothes. In fact, she throws in among her selections of affordable dresses, tops and pants, ranging from $33 to $70, a few satin baby doll night gowns, called "The Sexy Mama" and "Red Hot Mama."

"The whole philosophy is you should feel and look and experience womanliness at the time when you are most womanly," she says during a telephone interview from Los Angeles. "And for my husband and for a lot of husbands, it's nice for them to see you glowing. Clearly, you were a sexual being in the first place--you wouldn't be in this mess in the first place."

Jennifer Martin Curry of Zion says her husband continues to compliment her as she expands with twins.

"He makes me feel very sexy," she says. "But I think it's how your feel about yourself before and after that makes the difference. Being sexy is all in your mind."

Lange tries to heighten the feminine glow by designing pieces that don't camouflage, but accentuate a woman's assets: the arms, lower leg, the chest or waist.

"I think showing your stomach is for the beach and pool only," she says. "If you want to do that, more power to you. I am not against it, but it's not the Liz Lange look. At the end of the day, you ought to wear things that make you feel pretty, sexy and offer you a sort of pick-me-up. If it makes you feel pretty, it's served its purpose."

Krista Kaur Meyers, owner of Krista K boutique at 3458 N. Southport and an exclusive carrier of Liz Lange maternity, says Chicago women appreciate the subtle sexiness and don't mind paying the prices--tank tops ($50), pants ($150) and dresses ($200.)

"I haven't seen women anxious to show their naked belly," she says. "If they didn't show them before they were pregnant, they don't necessarily want to show them when they are pregnant. But they want to be fashionable and wear comfortable clothes."

But women such as Aronovitz and Huff aren't hiding behind muumuu floral maternity dresses. Aronovitz alternates between her Jean Paul Gaultier stretch pieces and her fun tops and low-slung maternity pants in a variety of colors.

And Huff sports her roomy peasant blouses from retailer Arden B. with her maternity pants and platform shoes.

"You need to keep your style," Aronovitz says. "Just because you are pregnant doesn't mean you need to have all of these clothes in your closet you wouldn't think of wearing."