Image via Complex Original
1.
If you've been paying a reasonable amount of attention to the fashion world lately you may have noticed a few things on the overall trend watch: Androgyny is having a moment and classic, timeless pieces are the new look that "never goes out of style," but maybe it's the sort of Eastern European look that's exploded the most. According to The Calvert Journal, the Cold War is fashion's new go-to inspiration.
Most of us are too young to really remember anything about the Cold War firsthand and since we didn't pay any attention in history class, we are also pretty ignorant overall. But this sort of "Eastern Bloc" style has blown up in just the past year or two thanks to designers like J.W Anderson and Gosha Rubchinskiy who have co-opted the look, playing on the fantasy of cool kids going to an after hours party in the late '80s or early '90s where the music is industrial and the rooms are dark. "RAF DID IT FIRST," scream Four Pins readers everywhere at nobody in particular.
Interestingly enough, that fantasy and, subsequently, its corresponding look, are not particularly luxurious in the slightest, but right now it's a thing and you can be sure there will be plenty of other designers on the beat soon. Whether it's just another shifting focus or something more substantial—like the Cold War trend's spiritual counterpart of overall youth obsession—we'll let anthropologists speak on that when the time comes. Perhaps the look and its popularity points to the actual tensions happening once again between the east and west, potentially foreshadowing another quiet conflict of ideals and will. Fashion imitating life, now wouldn't that be something?
[Photos via Opening Ceremony and The Independent]