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Predicting Fashion Trends: The Return of the Prepster

Fashion in American Society has traditionally been an ebb and flow between style, shock, non-conformity, sex appeal, utility, and artistic expression. During the 1800's American fashion took on a more rugged, utility based state. Jeans for durability, boots, flannels for warmth, and wide brimmed hats to keep the rain and sun out of your eyes. As more and more people began to live in cities, towns, and rural communities as opposed to the wide open wild spaces, fashion became more about aesthetics and less about utility.

Fashion, particularly for women, involved being covered from head to toe and not being seen out of the house without a hat. Showing just a little ankle was considered scandalous. Then came World War I. When the soldiers returned from Over There our country went through a period known as the roaring twenties. Women bobbed their hair and wore knee length skirts. Burlesque clubs popped up in the major cities. Soon prohibition was made the law of the land and the good times kept on rolling.

When the bubble burst in 1929 leading to the Great Depression, fashion was not on too many peoples’ minds except for the basic utility of being covered, keeping warm, and protection from the elements.

World War II lifted America out of its Depression. Returning soldiers found good paying jobs with ease upon returning home. During the 1950’s we saw an era of culture redefinition. Women, who worked during World War II, were now told to stay home and raise families. Kids were taught to respect their elders, dress respectably, and Dad always wore his smoking jacket. Men wore their grey flannel suits to work. The few women that were in the work place were typically secretaries, cooks, waitresses, cigarette girls, and nurses.

Fashion Rebellion among teens in the 50’s took on the form of bobby soxers, sweater girls, poodle skirts, greasers, and hot roding. By the early 60’s a whole generation of children had grown up watching TV, eating TV dinners, and living a life without the major dilemmas of their parents and grandparents such as the Great Depression and World War II.

The early 60’s saw the rise of the beatnik. Young people with more leisure time than previous generations began expanding their horizons opening up to new philosophies, religions, drug experimentation, and various forms of artistic expression. Folk music became big along with cafes, poetry, and one person plays.

The mid to late 60’s saw a culture clash of huge proportions. The older generation was trying to go back to the 1950’s perception of reality while the younger generations were rejecting everything their parents found respectable. Long hair, bright colors, and loose, comfortable clothes became the order of the day.

By the 70’s hippie culture became the norm. Bell bottoms got wider, colors brighter, hair got bigger, and shows got taller. The 70’s saw a culmination of drug excess, fashion excess, music excess and political excess.

Sandwiched between the 70’s and 80’s was the punk movement. It really started in England out of necessity. People were so poor that they could not afford decent clothes. You wore what you had and that was often ratty old clothing. This became the style and people added their own artistic influence to it. Punk not only fought against the Disco 70’s but it also sought to hold off the preppy 80’s.

By the 80’s people were exhausted. For a short time our culture tried to return back to a so called respectable format. The 80’s boomed, yuppies sprang up, and people once again sought to look what society deemed as respectable. Punk turned into new wave and for a while people seemed somewhat respectable to even the staunchest conservative.

The early 90’s brought out the urge for rebellion among the youth. Kids didn’t want to wear nice clothes to go to school, work, or job interviews. These were the hippie’s children. Many hippies dropped their hippy ways as they aged. Their children seeing documentary after documentary on the 60’s, a rash of Vietnam War movies, hearing about Woodstock, the free sex and drugs, and the continual touring of the Grateful Dead, did indeed turn out to make the 90’s seem like the 60’s upside down as Dennis Hopper once said.

Whatever it was, the youth culture couldn’t get enough. Brighter hair, pink and purple hair, multiple piercings, tattoos, etc what ever it was, people kept pushing and pushing the envelope.

Now, I am leaving out many trends that occurred in the 90’s and even in the 80’s. Mainly this is because I am trying to broad brush treat over 100 years of culture, an admit ably impossible task. I would be remiss if I at least did not mention rap, gangster rap, and hip hop culture.

The 90’s really was a culmination of the 60’s, 70’s, and 80’s all mixed up. Bell bottoms came back along with low rise jeans, tie dye shirts, platform shoes, short shorts, and all of it was mixed with the fashion of hip hop R&B rap.

Another aspect of the 90’s that may be a discussion for another time was the observable openness of bisexuality and lesbianism. When I was in college, the majority of women were experimenting sexually with other women as well as men. It actually became socially acceptable to a certain degree for a young woman to be bisexual.

Ok, so here we are in the 21 st century. Fashion has become about ass antlers, whale tails, muffin tops, low rise jeans, tattoos, piercings, multicolored hair, over size pants with frayed cuffs, pants that fall off the ass and expose boxers or underwear. You name it, it seems to go. In the work place most people are not expected to remove their earrings anymore or cover their tattoos. People are no longer turned away from work or school for having long hair, no hair, or pink hair. Young girls parade around happily in low rise jeans with their plumber’s cracks proudly being displayed for all to see.

Where can this all go? Where can this lead? Will people just start walking around naked ten years from now? All the shock value is gone from fashion.

This is why I am making this bold prediction. I predict that by 2010 we will see a return of the prepster. But people won’t be dressing like preppies to conform to society’s wishes. They will be dressing preppie to rebel against the majority of people who all wear low rise jeans, display their ass antlers, and have more piercings on their face than a pin cushion.

As Jane’s Addiction once said, Nothing’s Shocking. Indeed, what may be more shocking one day is simply not being shocked any more.