PREPPER TO WORKLEISURE: NEW TRENDS IN THE PRESS
“The Dawn of Quarcore:
What Prepper Fashion Can Tell Us About the Future of Clothes” by Rachel Tashjian
From GQ, April 23, 2020
The merging of prepper culture, which purports to traffic in need, with the fashion world, which purports to traffic in desire, can seem like a sloppy collision. The prepper, or survivalist, movement, encourages the acquisition of clothing, tools, and weapons in advance of global threats and crises. It dates back to the middle of the 20th century, when Americans, living in fear of nuclear war, stocked up on canned food and built bunkers, but it has gained traction this century following 9/11 and, over the past decade, amidst a mounting sense of international instability.
(As the onset of the novel coronavirus began, it has also brought a wave of “I told you so’s” from the prepper community, earned or not.) What prepper culture is really about is building, and then quelling, anxiety to encourage consumerism. (…) As the pandemic continues with no clear end in sight, the warcore, or prepper, aesthetic seems poised to move further into the mainstream. Designers borrowing from the movement are realizing that “this isn’t just a novelty, niche group,” Hansen said. “There’s an underserved population that has anxiety, and why don’t we create clothing that meets some of those concerns?”
“Is Sustainable Loungewear the Future of Fashion?” by Eliza Huber From Refinery29, August 13, 2020
Six months ago, the only thing that would get me to even look at a matching sweatsuit was Zoë Kravitz – wearing one (from Entireworld) underneath a moss-green Loewe duster. Now, I, and just about everyone else on the planet, hardly go a few days without slipping one on. (...) anything that’s not elastic, monochrome, and made of jersey simply doesn’t suit my dressing needs anymore. That’s what happens when a pandemic ushers most of the population indoors for half a year’s time: we bunker down and get comfortable. But comfort level isn’t the only variable we look at when shopping for loungewear these days. Instead, the farther we get into the pandemic, and the more we see how our everyday behaviors, from plane, train, and car travel to our fashion consumption habits, contribute to the environment’s demise the more focused we are on shopping ethically and sustainably. (…) Given that many people will not be going back to their offices until next year, the end of the loungewear boom is nowhere in sight. But that doesn’t mean that every brand under the sun should stop what they’re doing and jump on the sweatpants bandwagon, at least not before considering how they’re going to do so, from materials to supply chain, packaging, and beyond.
“Behold, ‘Workleisure’” by Vanessa Friedman
From The New York Times, August 20, 2020
A few years ago there was an attempt to introduce the term “workleisure” to our dressing vernacular. It did not take off, perhaps for obvious linguistic reasons. However, as a concept, its time may have come. Free of the saccharine preachiness of “athleisure,” but with the same implications of comfort, workleisure (a reward to whoever can come up with a better term) is more creative than “business casual,” which was really just a suit with a mismatched jacket and pants. What are its hallmarks? (…) For me, workleisure begins with the basics of the off-duty wardrobe (T-shirts, pullovers, track pants) translated in the materials and details of the office. That means elastic waistbands are acceptable, but only if attached to the type of fabric – silk, linen, wool, pinstripes – that suggests a different kind of effort. That, when you catch them out of the corner of your eye, suggest you sit up just a little bit straighter. It means T-shirts fancied-up with embroidery. It means jackets with the structure taken out, so they are more like shirts, but still jackets, and shirts with a bit of slink. Ultimately, it means the Zoom sweater, but blanket-striped, perhaps with one of the stripes glinting with sequins. And with it, promise.
“Dazed Media’s Trend Report on the Future of Youth Culture” From Dazed & Confused, June 24, 2020
Consulting over 3500 members of the Dazed audience – from the UK, Europe, UAE, USA, Russia, China and beyond, as well as a panel of fifteen expert voices from across fashion, technology, culture, trend forecasting and media – the report has been created by Dazed Studio’s Creative Strategist Izzy Farmiloe and insight consultant Rhianna Cohen. It explores how the hyper-connectivity and self-surveillance wrought by the age of social media has changed the ways we formulate and articulate our identities. How polarised politics have made us rethink the meaning of leadership as we look for new, more authentic icons. How increased global migration has led to the crosspollination of cultural reference points. How a global pandemic signals a reversion to analogue values in a digital age. This report is about people and their shifting perspectives and desires. Coronavirus hasn’t created a dystopia, it’s revealed one. Coronavirus didn’t kill the celebrity, it was already dying. This isn’t cause for alarm, rather an opportunity for reset, and the chance to shape a new world. Consumers are questioning everything – it’s unrealistic to expect to have all the answers, but you’d be wise to ask the same ones they are.