Photo-Illustration: By The Cut; Photos: Getty Images, Netflix, Balenciaga
Over the past twelve months, the often pristine runways have been transformed into something out of a Doomsday movie. At Balenciaga’s latest show (the same fashion house that spent the month embroiled in an ad campaign scandal) and at the Tom Brown show, the blizzard was post-human “mud.” Celebrities such as Doja Cat sat in front during Paris Fashion Week as the models walked down the aisle with lip plumping makeup. Fax Black eye. And in general, there was Julia Fox – always dressed as a strange futuristic gladiator. Seemingly descending into chaotic madness, 2022 fashion retold us how we’ve felt in the past few years amidst the pandemic and constant climate disasters.
But even before the start of the year, survival and dystopian fashion is on the rise. Marine Serre’s Fall 2020 show, for example, tackled the theme of death, and the cult favorite online ceramics “We Are all of them Dies” T later that year. While the aesthetic is nothing new for small labels like vegan shoe brand Rombaut, who have explored global campaign imagery and climate crisis content for years, 2018 saw several big-name designer brands make their own attempts to capitalize on it. It was in 2022. An increasingly eco-conscious market. That’s ironic, says Mats Rombaut, brand creative director of Rombaut & Viron, considering the industry’s role in impending climate disaster.
“Fashion is a big contributor to pollution and climate change,” says Rombaut, “so it’s only natural to think about this tragic end as a big part of the problem and show models like us in this post-apocalyptic and unlivable world.” Done for spring and summer 2022. Of course, not all fashion brands are this self-aware – some think it looks good. As Rombaut puts it, apocalyptic fashion trends can be a reaction to mainstream aesthetics. “I guess people are bored by the standards, and the algorithm is always looking for something new to grab our attention and keep us looking at our screens,” he said.
And the algorithm has got the devastation it needs – from broken memes and AI death predictions on TikTok to entire (and popular) Instagram accounts with abandoned houses and Twitter’s painful death march. The Oxford English Dictionary was created Goblin mode It is the 2022 word of the year. Climate change, the erosion of women’s rights and economic instability “signal that we are living in a period of decay,” said trend forecaster Agustina Panzoni. Panzoni envisions this fashion season as an evolution of the “fussy basics” trend that dominated the runways in 2021 — seen from designers like Dion Lee, Ruve and Clarissa Larrazabal — all basics that rebel to the point of losing theirs. Utility. Just as that trend speaks to a collective desire for hedonism after spending 2020 indoors, this year’s apocalyptic campaigns will refer to “shifting society’s priorities toward community, creativity, and violence,” Panzoni says.
While it may seem bleak and hopeless to dress our emotions as the world falls on itself, Panzoni believes it can actually be a good thing – an opportunity for growth. For the fashion industry, this seems like a transition from endless micro-trends and fast fashion houses to building an enduring personal style. “This year we’ve seen a lot of fashionistas participating in what I’ve created called ‘Sculptural Style,’” Panzoni said. This may seem like the creators of Tik Tok are trying to “innovate a position” with the pieces they already own – from dopamine shopping to dopamine recycling. “As fast fashion designs respond to the ubiquity of fashion, Apocalyptic Fashion calls for a sense of rebellion by asking what fashion photography can do – giving style enthusiasts the only alternative,” says Panzoni. In other words, who needs to buy more fast fashion when you’re trying to wear your sweater as a slip dress?
In the year By 2023, Panzoni says we can expect absolute chaos. “We’ll see the popular aesthetic of 2022 take a darker path, ballet core will incorporate grunge elements, twee will go sleazy, and Barbie-core will go goth,” she says, “expressing our desire for fashion that looks as solid as our reality.” It sounds like it’s in progress. Wednesday Inspiration for clothes and cosmetics. It could mean the end of beauty-core culture that’s constantly spinning online (RIP coastal-grandma-core) because everything is trending at once. anything Trending? “We see beauty breaking down, collapsing and melting together, the cultural theme of chaos rising from the ashes,” Panzoni says. That might look like Adam Sandler–core or other completely anti-beauty trends—which might temporarily ease the burden of online perfectionism, but like any trend, it comes at a cost.
The truth is, designer brands will do anything to stay relevant even when the world is collapsing beneath us. This is something smaller brands like Solitude Studios have always known. And when it comes to staying relevant, there’s no easier way than tapping into online culture. “The relationship between memes and culture – and in this instance, fashion – can be seen in the same way as people and nature,” said Jonas Seyed Gamal Brun, founder and creative director of Solitude Studio.
“Culture is based on itself – just like nature,” adds Sofia Martinsson, the brand’s other creative director. So, if the Internet is rotting food, the culture that eats it is becoming fertilizer. When asked what comes after apocalyptic fashion trends and clothing decay, the designer agrees, “Apocalyptic, hopefully.”
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