Photo Illustration: By The Cut.Photo: Getty Images, Netflix, Balenciaga
The last 12 months have transformed a normally pristine runway into something of a doomsday movie.There was a post-human “Madway” at Balenciaga’s latest show (the same fashion house that spent the month at the center of an ad campaign scandal) and a blizzard at Thom Browne’s show. Walking the catwalks in lip filler makeup, celebrities like Doja Cat take the front row at Paris Fashion Week fake black eye. And throughout it all, there was Julia Fox — always dressed as a weird futuristic gladiator. Inside we visualized how we felt in the last few years and sold it back.
But even before the year really began, existential and dystopian fashion was on the rise. released its viral. all Dies at the end of that same year’ Tee. That aesthetic was nothing new to smaller labels like his Rombaut, a vegan footwear brand that has explored world-ending campaign imagery and climate crisis content for years, but 2022 In the past, several well-known designer brands have tried their own approaches. A market that is becoming more and more concerned about the environment. Mats Rombaut, creative of brands Rombaut and Víron and his director, says it’s ironic given the role the industry plays in impending climate change.
“Fashion contributes significantly to pollution and climate change,” says Rombout. We did it in the spring and summer of 2022. Of course, not all fashion brands realize this. As Rombout says, apocalyptic fashion trends can be a response to mainstream beauty. “I think people are getting bored with standards,” he says.
And algorithms found the ruins they were looking for — from rotten memes on TikTok and AI-powered death predictions, to entire Instagram accounts devoted to (and popular) abandoned houses, to painful death marches on Twitter. Until. The Oxford English Dictionary was made goblin mode This is the word of the year in 2022. Trend forecaster Agustina Panzoni says worsening climate conditions, the disenfranchisement of women and economic instability all point to the fact that we are living in an age of corruption. Panzoni sees this fashion moment as an evolution of the “disruptive basics” trend that dominated the 2021 runways. We see this in designers like Dion Lee, Lube, and Clarissa Larrazabal. utility. This year’s apocalyptic campaign addresses “shifting societal priorities for community, creativity and rebellion,” as the trend spoke of a collective appetite for hedonism after spending 2020 indoors. doing.
Wearing our feelings that the world is collapsing can seem dark and hopeless, but Panzoni believes it’s actually a good thing and an opportunity to grow. For the industry, this may seem like a shift away from endless microtrends and fast-fashion houses and towards building a sustainable personal style. “This year, I’ve seen a lot of fashion personalities working on what I’ve dubbed ‘sculptural styling,'” he says. This might look like TikTok creators experimenting with “creative positioning” of the work they already own, moving from dopamine shopping to dopamine repurposing. “It calls for the rebellious sentiment of apocalyptic fashion,” he says Panzoni. In other words, who needs to buy more fast fashion when you can wear a sweater as a slouchy skirt?
As for 2023, Panzoni says he expects absolute chaos. “2022’s popular aesthetic will take a darker twist, ballet-her core will incorporate elements of grunge, twee will be sleezy, and Barbie-her core will be goth,” she says. As crude as our reality. After many people have spent Thanksgiving turning to Netflix, it already feels like this shift is underway. Wednesday For clothing and makeup inspiration. It could mark the end of the ever-rotating online aesthetic core culture (RIP Coastal-grandma-core). everything trend? “Cultural themes of chaos will emerge from the ashes as aesthetics are deconstructed, distorted and merged,” he says Panzoni. That might seem like an aesthetic trend that defies Adam Sandlercore-like aesthetics.
But the reality is that designer brands will do anything to be relevant enough to sell, even if the world crumbles under us. always know. And there’s no easier way to stay relevant than with online culture. “The relationship between memes and culture, and in this case fashion, can be captured in the same way humans and nature are,” says Solitude Studios founder and creative director Jonas Saeed Gammal Bruhn. increase.
“Culture, like nature, relies on itself,” adds Sophia Martinussen, the brand’s other creative director. If the Internet becomes rotten food that dissolves in the soil, the culture that feeds it becomes fertilizer. Apocalyptic fashion When asked what happens after her deconstruction of trends and clothing, the designer-duo agrees, “Apocalypse, hopefully.”
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