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Swing State Style
The American heartland is influencing more than politics this season as sturdy, no-frills fashions hit the blues states. Is plaid the new black?
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Swing states are having their moment this season—in fashion as well as politics.
Sure, big-gun blue states like California and New York provided a huge chunk of electoral meat to President-elect Obama, but everyone knows that without the crucial wins in the swing states, the history we witnessed last Tuesday night would not have been made.
“While we were celebrating here in New York, we should have raised our glasses to the voters in Virginia and Florida and Ohio because they were the ones who decided to change course, and who decided the election,” wrote Jay McInerney in The Independent the day after the election. “We should feel very glad to have them back. After all, a liberal elite can't run a democracy by itself.”
The election marked a turning point, and a new spirit of unity. Through this profound and deep gesture, the swing states dipped their toes into what it meant to be national tastemakers. So shouldn’t their next contribution to society also be just as culturally relevant? This is an important opportunity for a new nonpartisanship in fashion. Let’s re-draw the lines of the nation’s wardrobe and switch up the color palette!
On Election Day, Americans across the country cast their ballots wearing emblems of practicality: jeans, sneakers, plaid button-down shirts, parkas and hooded sweatshirts. Not the stuff of runway fantasy, but of hard-working American pragmatists.
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Back to plaid...
There's a lot of plaid in the fall collections in Paris, Milan and London too. Suzy Menkes did a column on plaid about a week ago in the International Herald Tribune, but instead of American midwest plaid, she talked about plaid's ancient celtic roots made modern by Alexander McQueen etc...and of course punk because she's English. I live in Paris and blue and green plaid is the BCBG (bon chic bon genre or fat cat preppy) standard in both good times and bad; French people here are nototoriously close to their "sous" and the last thing they want is to display any overt bling bling.
I'm looking forward to fashion taking a more commn touch. Back in the day the most chic thing was to look "young," now it's too much about "luxury." And I can't think of anything stodgier than luxe. Let's give the cashmere a rest!
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