... because I don't understand fashion anymore. Boys: Why belt your jeans *underneath* your arse, thereby showing me your greying pants? Why think that trucker caps look good? Why emulate Russell Brand's hairstyle? The latter I would hope is pure laziness, though I have a sneaking suspicion it takes longer to style mops like that than to cook a 3 course meal...
I went to a gig on Wednesday night at Birmingham University's student Guild (it was rather excellent and involved amp fires and drummer fights - rock and roll!) so I was probably asking for my eyes to be assaulted by dreadful 'fashionable' outfits sported by 18-21 year olds. The pinnacle of nastiness was a girl who was wearing extremely tight and extremely high cut jeans with neat little turn ups to show off her black patent sensible lace ups (last worn by my mother in 1985) plus a puffed sleeve white shirt tucked in. If I'd have worn that I'd have been quite rightfully beaten with sticks and hounded out of the town.
I came to the conclusion, with the help of C, that this is because these people never had to live through the 80s when they actually happened. Horror of horrors the next crop of undergraduates will have been born in 1990. I was aged 3-13 in the 80s, and these were formative years where you make your worst fashion and hair mistakes. My worst that I can remember off hand, which I may dig out a photo of if you're 'lucky', was ski pants with deck shoes (blue with white cording), topped off with a lilac bodywarmer. (As an aside - when did bodywarmers suddenly become gilets?).
I've realised that most people are happy with the fashions of their early twenties. Hence people in their forties still dressing in a slightly 80s way (though not to the ridiculous extents of the youth of today) and people of my age sticking with the mid-late 90s (I am at my happiest in slightly flared cords plus a top with different coloured sleeves - which in turn is an homage to the 70s). It's all extremely cyclical, and I'm just hoping that in 5-10 years time that young people will not be stalking the streets in shellsuits...
Friday, 14 March 2008
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1 comment:
Astute stuff madam.
I think the early-20's fashion cryogenisis is definitely an intriguing notion. Sadly, what is one meant to do if the fashions of the day during that period for you are quite simply not viable?
I for example lived the first 5 years of my 20's during the rise of skinny jeans, thanks to the likes of the Strokes, the Hives and At the Drive In gracing tv screens and youtube pages across the nation with their juddering, rake-like forms.
Not being in an anatomical position to support such a look, and now no longer being in my 20's, am I destined to drift forever, my fashion proclivities never being preserved in amber like everyone else's.
I suppose I could start by pulling my jeans up?
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