There's something to be said about waking up one day to realize that you're seeing signs of the times. I mean look at the late Summer 2017 hurricane season already with Harvey, Irma and the impending José and try to convince me that global warming isn't a 'thing'. Look at the backpedalling, double-talking and hypocritically elementary speech the wafts out of 45's mouth and try to convince me that the media reports of a crumbling government and dodgy out of touch privileged politics are really fake news. Look at mens fashion....wait a minute, look at mens fashion! It's kind of all over the place. Never before have men been massaged into whatever niche works for them than now with the immaculately bespoke, made-to-measure or off-the-rack tailored rubbing elbows with the DIY urban gym class heroes & detention slackers who hobnob with the modern floral-toting bedazzled rockstars that tout locs, grills and platinum Jesus-pieces.
I've spoken before about the state of modern menswear languishing in a state that womenswear has long enjoyed, but now I realize more and more how the aspect of modernity consistently aims to rewrite the dialogue of mens clothing. Of course, you will always have your designers who write in their journal after the headlines have been heralded which is not to be downplayed since many men will only be able to afford such designers. However, there seems to be a crop of creatives like Abloh, Gvasalia, Michele, Lorenzo, Rubchinskiy, Simons, et al who realize that not only do other designers' imitating what they propose have significance, but also the way in which the public interprets and absorbs the designs have great significance too in understanding social movements, thoughts, interests and tendencies.
It seems that in the era of the public (and government) being suitably liberated to say and behave how they really feel, as unique or sheeplike as it may be, they've gained some power in dismantling the status quo. Now more out of the hands of buyers, merchandisers and editors, the masses are using platforms like social media and social gatherings involving fashion, music and art to assert how loud they want to yell as opposed to being told how loud they should yell. What we're winding up with is an extremely quick-paced system that is getting increasingly harder and harder to predict and that rides waves based on hype, collective synergism and individual creativity. Hype needs influence & hysterical following and is not necessarily rooted in groundbreaking talent, collective synergism needs groups of creatives supporting a movement and individual creativity, as always, can just get lucky in marching to the beat of its own drum.
We're seeing effects of this in how designers are proposing collections and the individual pieces in those collections. There's a push to just dismantle the old system of creating a highly merchandisable collection to just creating inspired unique pieces, no matter how questionable that inspiration is to some since they may only have the public's attention for a minute anyway. Deliveries are becoming decided over at closer spaced-out dates due to the rapidly changing and restructuring social media environ and the often finicky, very persuadable and very visual public. You get magazine spreads and decide what to wear and what not to wear everyday on your social media timelines. Individual styling has become key in runway collections as designers realize that suggesting effective public re-interpretations of their clothing can clear the shelves while big-ticket red carpet arrivals share the stage with even a celeb shopping incognito and can become the next style-note to watch.
Timing and being in the right place at the right time and surrounded by the right impressionable eyes has grown essential as its become not just what is donned but at what locale, at what event and by whom which then coincides with said person's current level of mass influence or cult-following. To be everywhere at once and to know a little bit of everything about, well, everything is a daunting task and quite impossible, but I suppose that is why some of us tune-out in annoyance yet stay-tuned for the challenge.
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