Monthly Archives: August 2009
Hardy Amies
In 1965 Saville Row tailor Hardy Amies published the “ABC of Mens Fashion” setting out the rules and advice for men to achieve sartorial perfection. Recently the book was republished, and the Guardian ran an article testing whether these classic rules still apply. You can read it here.
Amies is a pretty interesting character. He first [...]
Posted in Brands, Vintage Clothes 2 Comments
The Leather Jacket
The leather jacket remains an iconic classic, moving from military bomber jackets in the 1950s to fashion uniform for rockers, punks, grunge kids and hip-hoppers alike. With each new trend, the leather jacket has been adapted and evolved – a longer, blazer cut in the 1970s for example, or tassled and studded in the 80s. [...]
Posted in 80s clothes, Vintage Clothes 3 Comments
The Modern High-Street
Today the high-street is dominated by brands like Topshop and H&M that cater to the constantly changing trends of young people. Its easy to see the appeal of this market, especially during the current recession. A recent article in The Independent newspaper, evaluates how certain brands have fared during the first crucial months of ‘The [...]
Posted in 80s clothes, Brands, Swap Clothes, Vintage Clothes Leave a comment
Generation X
Since that initial ‘identity crisis’ in the 1980s, brands consistently targeted young people, their trends and sub-cultures as a goldmine of potential profit. Some trends lent themselves to this commercialisation more than others. Hip-Hop kids, as I have said, took pride in consuming and displaying affiliation with brands. It was therefore easy for brands like [...]
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Logo-Mania
Hip-Hop’s embracing of particular brand logos from the early 80s, soon became a youth culture staple. Overt logos on clothing denoted the wearers affiliation with a particular trend in the same way Teddy Boys and Mods had reappropriated vintage clothes to signify their look.
In Britain, the Football Casuals favoured Armani, Burberry and Ralph Lauren [...]
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Hip-Hop
In the early 1980s, the American mass-market suffered a huge “identity crisis” (Klein, 2000). ‘Household’ brands found that the customer loyalty they had built up since the 50s, suddenly dissipated during the 1981-1982 recession. According to Klein, analysts found that the only goods to ‘hold steady’ during the recession, were “beer, soft drinks, fast food [...]
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Mods and Rockers
A few more brief notes on how today’s vintage trend developed from the desires of young people to set themselves apart from accepted ideas of fashion, that as I’ve said, really kicked off with the newly liberated Teddy Boys of the 1950s…
In the 1960s, Mods and Rockers took over as the predominant genres. These subcultures [...]
Posted in Vintage Clothes 2 Comments
Teddy Boys
Over the next few posts I thought I’d move away from talking about current trends, and explain more about the history of vintage fashion. I’ve chosen a few brief passages from my dissertation (yep, I wrote an entire dissertation about vintage clothes!) that illustrate key moments over the last fifty years that have made the [...]
Posted in Vintage Clothes 4 Comments
The 90s
Oh my goodness, would you believe it. It seems after only a short season dominated and inspired by 80s clothes, fashion journalists and trend analysists are already predicting a shift towards the 90s. Although the 80s trend will undoubtedly remain a steadfast feature of the highstreet for the near future, the indicators are already there [...]
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More Leather Jackets