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Main >> Previous Updates >> March 2005 >> March 27, 2005 >> Article ID 7681
 Down and out and fashion forward | Type: Internet Article |
| | Down and out and fashion forward | Mar 27, 2005 | by Jackie White
Summary:
It's a far-right turn from the recent rich-girl's style entrenched in Gucci or Prada, the Times notes. And it's a long way from the previously influential celebrity dress from Christina Aguilera and Paris Hilton.
Read on for the whole article. |
Mary-Kate Olsen, the 18-year-old self-made multimillion
aire, is on the front line of a new fashion movement rooted ironically in street poverty.
The New York Times calls it “Dumpster chic.”
She and twin sister Ashley are influencing young women, including fellow students at New York University, where they are seen wearing mishmash combinations, baggy skirts, street-dragging cable cardigans, floppy hats and giant sunglasses. They are emphasizing the down-and-out look with expensive touches such as cashmere mufflers and a French designer's status bag.
It's a far-right turn from the recent rich-girl's style entrenched in Gucci or Prada, the Times notes. And it's a long way from the previously influential celebrity dress from Christina Aguilera and Paris Hilton.
The look today may involve a well-worn bag, peasant skirts, vintage sweaters, jackets with frayed edges and scuffed cowboy boots topped with a pricey shearling coat.
Some pundits see it as a rejection of the excessive ostentation that has swept our society and, at the same time, an inability to let go of luxury completely. It's compared to the bohemian wave of the 1960s when young people were embarrassed by their parents' materialism and adapted worker smocks and peasant shirts.
But it could evolve into a bigger picture. The conventional assumption is that the pendulum will soon begin to swing. And today's extremes in luxury will trigger a backlash with new appreciation of more pared-down simplicity. It's odd to see the Olsens out front.
Do the math
Changes traditionally come slowly in the men's clothing world. It took awhile in the '90s for the more forward three-button suit to replace the two-button in men's wardrobes. And for some men, it never did.
Now the Wall Street Journal reports a shift in the other direction. Sales of two-button suits are on the rise at high-end stores, certainly an indication of what's to come. Some suit makers have already dropped three-buttons from the line.
It's not as if you can pull out your old suits and suddenly look dapper. Manufacturers have raised the top button a tad and narrowed the lapels, the WSJ notes.
And three buttons are still OK to wear as long as you leave the top button undone and let at least half or more of your tie show, the experts say.
Don't be too nonchalant about these fashion movements. The upcoming generation is more style-conscious and open to faster changes than their dads, especially in urban centers.
Working clothes
The more frenetic life gets, the more help we need with the most basic daily routines.
When a woman has five minutes to shower before she drives the carpool, she doesn't have much time to slather on body creams.
Enter here a new rendition of smart clothes: a camisole and briefs that moisturize the body. They are from Olga, the lingerie maker, and they incorporate “Lycra's Body Care,” a system of built-in micro-beads that release aloe vera onto the skin as you move.
It's no big surprise. Clothing, of course, continues to get smarter. It heats up in cold and cools down in warm. It pulls moisture away from the body during workouts. And it's been wired to play music. So it all makes you wonder what's next.
Meanwhile, camisoles are $22 at stores such as Bloomingdale's, Marshall Fields, Carson Pirie Scott and Macy's.
A comeback story
A few weeks ago, the poncho was history.
After almost a year on top of the must-have fashion list in a wide range of prices and fabrics including leather eyelet, it ran its course. It was destined to join micro-mini skirts, big shoulders and pashmina shawls in trend heaven.
Then Martha Stewart walked out of prison late one dark night in a poncho crocheted by a fellow inmate. It was a life-saving injection.
Lion Brand Yarn Co., a hand-knitting yarn company, began getting e-mail inquiries about a poncho pattern. So it posted pattern and yarn for Stewart's wrap on its Web site, www.LionBrand. com, the afternoon of March 11. In the first week, almost 300,000 people downloaded it. The company later added a knit version and got a big boost when Stewart herself mentioned the posting in an online chat. The company estimates downloads are running 40,000 to 50,000 a day.
Ilana Rabionowitz, public relations spokesperson, says her original expectations were “maybe we'd get about 10,000.”
The poncho, of course, with its simple unstructured shape and fringed edges, is rooted in the hippie culture of the early '70s along with granny dresses and ragged jeans. It suddenly came out of nowhere last spring.
Now thanks to a world where knitting and crochet crafts have become therapeutic obsessions, here it comes again.
Do you really want to know?
Is the 90-minute spinning class really worth it? Are we as lean and mean as we think?
Usually if you really want to know, you drag yourself to a doctor's office or a gym to have body fat measured.
But soon you'll be able to track it every day with HoMedics' Total Body Fat Analyzer, a home scale that will tell you where the fat is on your upper and lower body. The Wall Street Journal says it indicates how much body water you have and your skeletal body mass.
Available in the fall for $140, it was on display recently at the International Home & Housewares Show in Chicago. Frankly we think some things are better left untold.
More or less?
You are sporting Jimmy Choo's new pricey pumps. You just spent a week having grape-seed facials at a California spa. You're looking at Ferraris. And you're having a custom portrait painted of your dog
Congratulations. You are on trend. Today's society is in a more-is-more mood, with many people loving the luxury of the most distinctive customized products, says Hallmark trend expert Marita Wesely-Clough.
On the other hand, if you are put off by the flash and cash, you are not alone. The counter trend to the best-is-best philosophy is a growing belief that enough-is-enough and it's time to scale down. The notions that friends, family and community contributions matter more is a philosophy fueled especially by baby boomers edging up to retirement.
These observations are also included in Wesely-Clough's latest trend forecast for 2005.
• A rising influence from Asia in philosophy, aesthetics and, even more significant, in low-cost manufacturing and social issues.
• A collective sense of global neighborhood as seen in the outpouring of aid to tsunami victims or worldwide pride in space accomplishments. |
 Source: Kansas City Star | |
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