Coco Chanel first elevated the humble striped Breton top to style status. In the 1930s she designed and wore a striped marinière with palazzo pants - a look adopted from French sailors. 
Since then many designers and style-setters have followed suit. Brigitte Bardot was a fan, wearing hers barefoot and pouting on a breezy beach.
Edie Sedgwick teamed hers with black tights and nothing else, while Jane Birkin wore hers with faded flares, and just about every singer from Debbie Harry to Chrissie Hynde to Patti Smith has worn one since. Bananarama wore theirs with baggy Levi's. More recently, Kylie Minogue has incorporated them successfully into her off-duty look and Alexa Chung is making a play to become the new patron saint of Breton tops.
And it didn't do it for women only, of course - it's a sailor's garment, after all; Pablo Picasso, James Dean, Iggy Pop and Kurt Cobain have all succumbed. Karl Lagerfeld often reinterprets them for Chanel, Japanese label Comme des Garçons shows the Breton as a constant in its collections, and Jean Paul Gaultier uses them as a cheeky reference to his national dress in the way that a Scottish designer might play with tartan.
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