March, 2014 - The Seventh Sphinx

Like I was saying in the previous post, there are so many active trends in women’s fashion right now (and new ones born every day, it seems), if you want to look on trend, it’s almost too easy…

Just wear:

anything plaid

denim on denim

a tulle skirt with button-up shirt and/or a leather jacket, alternatively a pleated skirt

lots of little gold/rose gold/silver rings, esp with a hammered finish, esp not quite matching in style

lots of big, chunky rings

all white

high waisted denim shorts, high waisted anything

a tuxedo blazer, esp with jeans and a t-shirt

leather pants, alternatively leather overalls, alternatively a leather skirt

your jacket unbuttoned, esp your jacket just over your shoulders

white pumps

brightly colored shoes, esp heels and oxfords

heels and skinny jeans (this trend isn’t going anywhere)

flats and skinny jeans (ditto)

a jumpsuit

bold brows, esp with freckles (freckles are totally trending)

heels with asymmetrical silhouettes and one or both sides open

loose, slightly messy bohemian hair, esp long

anything that could be characterized as Parisian

chunky gold jewelry, chunky white jewelry, or some combination of the two

a floppy felted wool hat

a wiggle dress (think MadMen)

a mid-length skirt or dress with a weighty boot or a bright sneaker, esp Doc Martens or Converse (or similar)

graphic prints, alternatively graphic eyeliner

lots of layers, as in 4+ layers, where each is partly visible

a pencil skirt, esp if not black or gray

oxford pumps

a leather jacket, esp if not black or brown

metallic shoes

lipstick, esp oranges, esp brights, esp mattes

a long, full skirt, esp with boots

white shirts, esp slouchy, v neck tees

western clothes in African prints

two of something you only need one of (2 button down shirts, 2 scarves, 2 belts, 2 pairs of socks, etc)

statement or retro (possibly outright bizarre) glasses or sunglasses

neon shoes and/or a neon bag

a skater skirt, a tea dress, a smock dress

men’s outerwear, esp a double breasted wool coat

vintage touches on an otherwise contemporary ensemble (a vintage lip color, broach, hairstyle, shoes, gloves, earrings,etc)

an elaborate belt with a simple dress

pointed flats, esp animal print (ballet flats in general going strong)

mustard

turquoise

royal blue (bordering on neon)

a sequined skirt/pants/blazer

a long necklace with a large pendant

plenty of bronzer and/or highlighter

a dainty gold necklace with a small round disc pendant (esp a virtually invisible pendant), esp several of these together

a formal or tailored skirt with a t-shirt, esp loose and plain, alternatively esp novelty tees, esp geeky novelty tees

anything remotely bohemian, including braided crowns or any messy braid, long messy hair, flowers in the hair, loose long dresses, lace dresses with tan leather boots, loose, unstructured tank tops with chunky jewelry, elaborately tooled leather belts, anything from Free People…

tribal-aesthetic jewelry

a bright eyeliner on the lower lash line only

bib necklaces, especially those with faceted stones, especially those with a mix of stones

heels and rolled boyfriend jeans, esp with holes

knee-high boots and a trench coat, esp in a jewel tone

jeans, a nice blazer, and loafers or athletic sneakers

unexpected floral print (as on boots, heels, loafers, pants, shorts, belts, socks), esp a vintage floral print (like vintage wallpaper)

stacking many, many bracelets (any kind will do)

knee socks

elaborate nail art

a messy topknot, esp with bangs, alternatively any J. Crew promo hairstyle

a slouchy, light-weight scarf worn loosely but closely gathered at the neck, esp in a bright color or silk

a men’s sweater, a men’s watch, a men’s blazer, or any combination

a cape

a minaudiere, alternatively any implausibly small bag, alternatively any implausibly large bag

ad just about infinitum

Appearing fashionable in the sense of ‘on trend’, then, is so straightforward as to be formulaic.

Roughly:

To look casually fashionable, do one or two of these things (or some other thing). Maybe only one if it’s the right one, and this list is not anywhere near exhaustive (which is part of the point I’m trying to make in making it so long), as one look at pinterest will show.

To look quite fashionable, do two or three of these things.

To look solidly fashionable indeed, do four or more of these things. This can be disastrous given an unfortunate combination or even just a lack of confidence. You might look like you are trying to hard or like you got dressed in the dark…or you might look awesome. I say don’t worry about it, though, just wear whatever you like. Attitude will carry the day.

[A cheeky demonstration would be ideal here but it is just too damn cold. Remind me later.]

Being on trend (let’s put off for now whether or not this desirable) is both more difficult and easier than ever before. There are currently, in this era, this time, more trends simultaneously alive and well than ever before. Pick up a magazine, read the fashion and style pages of some newsmonger or another, poke around on pinterest and street style blogs, watch Bill Cunningham, pay attention when you’re walking down the street – once you hit a certain threshold of data the trends jump out at you left and right. No matter how many there are, though, there’s still a [shifting, arbitrary, somewhat mysterious] hierarchy of cool.

Trends used to be small, powerful details, widely adopted, one following another from season to season. The length of a sleeve, the height of a hem, the volume or cut of a skirt, the placement of a broach. A distinct silhouette can be identified (there are fascinating charts for all kinds of fashion patterns) for almost every year throughout the 1800’s and much of the 1900’s.

image via dressmakingresearch.com

After this dating a photo with clothing gets a bit more difficult, perhaps you can only guess within a decade. We can still do this well up through the 90s. Perhaps there is a bit of branching off, several schools of trends can identify (or evoke) an 80s look. The Madonna school, the Michael Jackson school, the Pat Benetar school, and so on, but even these share umbrella traits of bold, geometric/unnatural silhouettes (think cone bra, think boxy shoulders), bright colors, loud accessories, over-the-top patterns. Like so many things that are tiresome or tricky to define, you know it when you see it.

Today, though, even aside from the fact that it’s impossible to have a comprehensive perspective on your own time, the trends are multiplying faster than we can wear them, and many of them stay active for years. There are so many it’s almost (almost) as if there aren’t any, and we have entered a new era of freedom and flexibility of dress*.

*Still nothing like what the future will see, surely.

There is no getting around it, trends are strange, complex social phenomena. Often baffling (if not outright awful), once in a while classic (a revival of some historic style of dress, maybe), or sophisticated to the modern eye. Highly mutable and notoriously difficult to predict, often with murky origins, they remind me a little of traffic patterns, which I understand to be difficult to predict and untangle cause-wise, approaching true randomness. They sometimes peter out within a month or so, and sometimes persist for many seasons, or persist to graduate out of trend status and into just…stuff we often wear. Some seem to become (or seem to be becoming—historians, I do not envy you your job) part of the conception of basic modern style.

Like anyone, I like some and don’t like others. I do sometimes find it difficult to suspend the awareness that something is a trend while assessing it, which can have a negative impact on my take. When I’ve seen something over and over…sometimes I start to come around. Some are broad (skinny jeans with heels), and some are almost comically detailed (dainty gold knuckle rings with a hammered finish, worn on multiple fingers at different heights). I suppose one convenient thing about trends is that they provide a straightforward formula to follow to look fashionable in the mainstream sense, and if you like the trend, why not? On the other hand, they can leech originality and personality right out of things, such that everyone looks kind of vaguely nice, and kind of vaguely like everyone else*. Then, too, there is the difficulty of discerning when a trend is on the wane, when it has passed some critical point of popularity and takes on an element of vulgarity (one sense of vulgar is simply common to the masses). I think ombre hair is entering this phase now, for example (I was never too keen on that one).

Sporting a trend successfully is about timing, and an ill-timed trend (at least, blindly followed, in the absence of individuality) undermines its own aim. There is something tiresome about the game of this, especially when they can turn sour so suddenly, but I think if you like a trend, go for it. If you stop liking it, you know…stop going for it (and question: did you really like it in the first place?).

Part ii will be a little list. Stay tuned.

*Type any keyword from the next post into pinterest and see what I mean.