quarta-feira, 12 de janeiro de 2011

The birth of a trend by Franca Sozzani

"Looking into fashion stories I've asked myself how do trends start, something you've also asked me quite often. Who starts them and makes them happen. I've already told that it's a mix of things, but some trends start with the genius of a designer and others with something else… nobody knows!  

There is some confusion. Sometimes you get mixed up with street trends that involve society and politics. When they say that punk is a trend - back this season -  it's a fatal mistake. Punk is a movement born in the 70s in the States and Great Britain, a special sub culture, punk means low quality and the word comes from music, American, Punk Rock.

In Great Britain they develop the look and the classic Brit Punk comes with Malcolm McLaren who with his wife Vivienne Westwood studies the clothes for a new music group formed by the sales people of the neighborhood's Pistols. Ripped clothes, chains, pins, buckles, locks, colored messy hair. As long as it's provocative.  

Punk represented the opponents, the chaos, and the bad boys. It didn't have a political meaning. Hard Core Punk initiated a political movement that got then taken over by Street Punk, anarchy and chaos. It moved then to Italy, Germany, and Berlin at the beginning of the 80s.  

When in fashion you talk about Punk you associate it with Vivienne Westwood, because she started it and then Rei Kawakubo and Junya Watanabe and now Balmain and Balenciaga, who reinterpreted this look and made it a fashion trend. I repeat, it started out as a movement and lately became a trend.  

You can say the same of grunge, Seattle in the 90s, it means trash. It represents a social attitude and opposition. It turns into fashion for Marc Jacobs when he designed for Perry Ellis putting it on the runaway. It's not a current. Again if they say grunge it means bad taste, Prada was the first to recognize it as such.  

This to say that all movements start out as spontaneous ones in the streets from a political or social current. When they're seen on the catwalk they become a fashion trend. Fashion history is full of these movements that became fashion trends from Mod's to Rockers there are many.  

Lets not even start with the military look that comes from the Vietnam war and the protest. Fashion takes this trend in.

There are then real trends that start out in the streets because trendsetters wear them or because celebrities do. See the Uggs, as I've mentioned before. There are creative geniuses, designers who invent things and influence people and customers, journalists and minor designers that copy them and make the trend even more famous.  

You shouldn't mix between the street trends, political movements and society with fashion trends. If you know this you are a step ahead in understanding trends. You have to be aware of what's happening around you and around the world."-vogue.it

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