The new catwalk: the arrival lounge
The way celebrities dress to travel and walk through airport terminals to the flash of paparazzi has always been a phenomenon. But when Timothée Chalamet arrived at Narita airport in Japan in November, wearing a serious look that didn’t exactly scream long-haul, despite being wipe clean, it set a new and unexpected tone for what is possible, if not necessarily desirable, to wear at 40,000ft. If the Wonka star is anything to go by then jogging bottoms are out, £2,497 latex trench coats are in.
Special mention must go to the “tourdrobe”, given that this was the year that Beyoncé and Taylor Swift toured the world, causing economic peaks in cities and seismic activity with their dancing fans. From Versace to Loewe, the outfits the pop stars wore on tour have made arena stages look like catwalks. How will Girls Aloud top it in 2024?
Fashion’s favourite fruit: the tomato
With red the hottest colour this year, the edible berry of the Solanum lycopersicum has been finding favour. Its vines grew over imagery in the warmer months with tomato girl summer, a vibe summed up by terracotta tiles, basket bags and espadrilles, taking over where the previous year’s short king spring left off. From heirloom to ketchup, tomatoes were huge on TikTok (and not in a GM way) and offered a welcome antidote to the cream hues that the “quiet luxury” trend brought with it.
Best courtroom style: Gwyneth Paltrow
From the Peter Pan collar Rebekah Brooks wore to appear in front of the Leveson inquiry to the butter-wouldn’t-melt short white frock worn by the fake heiress Anna Sorokin, courtroom style is often used as an attempt to signal innocence. Less regularly is it so stylish – and such an understatedly glaring marker of soft power – as when the Goop founder and actor Gwyneth Paltrow attended a Utah court earlier this year over a collision at a ski resort in 2016. Cream Loro Piana polo necks for £1,220, £3,900 earthy-green overcoats from The Row and slouchy grey blazers artfully styled with tucked in hair all signalled Paltrow as an old money icon. But the colours and cuts were just slouchy and just earthy enough to make this multimillionaire relatable to a jury.
Best-dressed fans: the Beyhive
Fandom is a big thing in the modern era, and what fans wear to watch their idols, whether on stage or the silver screen, is also a big deal. When Beyoncé came to town, her followers did not disappoint, showing up in silver cowboy hats and boots. The love was so strong that, for the launch of the Renaissance film in December, some even made it down to Leicester Square on a Friday lunchtime decked out in metallics and hats to sit through a documentary.
Most ubiquitous item: the Uniqlo crossbody bag
While an honourable mention must go to Cos’s quilted bag, which looks a lot like tripe in white, the Uniqlo “round mini” continued its 2022 ascent into this year. Anecdotally, the bag can be seen wrapped around the torsos of 72.5% of the UK population, and TikTok has remained a place for people to gather and gawp at just how much can fit into a receptacle of such modest proportions, Mary Poppins-style. It has been called the “millennial Birkin” by fashion insiders and shows no signs of going anywhere for the foreseeable.
Most in vogue poem: The Waste Land
They might not have had pearls for eyes, but when Kim Jones’s models walked the catwalk at Paris fashion week in January, wearing designs such as a yellow fisher’s jacket and sou’wester hats, their looks were inspired by the watery imagery of TS Eliot’s 1922 modernist masterpiece The Waste Land. Fashion loves verse, but this take on a musing on the futility of life, made into Dior menswear, was a twist that even Tiresias might not have seen coming.
Daftest accessory: the Millionaire Speedy bag
Last year, a clutch bag in the shape of a pigeon was big fashion potatoes. But this year, an even dafter bag has arrived on the scene. The Millionaire Speedy bag might look normal enough, for a luxury handbag, but the punchline is its $1m (£797,000) price tag.
Made of crocodile leather and encrusted in diamonds, it was first spotted being carried by its designer, the musician and Louis Vuitton men’s creative director Pharrell Williams, at Paris fashion week in June. Orsola de Castro, co-founder of Estethica and the fashion activism organisation Fashion Revolution, said of the bag: “In a world full of horrors, a sunshine yellow $1m bag doesn’t shine, it hurts.” Fashion is often daft, but this one takes the biscuit.
Most ‘fashion’ snack: Cheetos
This might come as a surprise but, from Florence Pugh holding a single Cheeto in a Vogue shoot to Kim Kardashian clutching a packet of them on the cover of GQ, it seems as if the crunchy corn puff is more desirable than any fancy canape this year.
Look down. Are you wearing a pair of jeans? A football top? Do you have a pint in your hand and some crisp dust on your fingers? If so, the good news is you are, perhaps inadvertently, nailing one of the hottest looks in fashion from the past year.
The ordinariness of so-called blokecore was part of the charm of this football-adjacent look, especially in the UK. As Vice put it: “At first glance, blokecore isn’t a new look – especially not to British people. If anything, it’s a law of averages among football fans, with a throwback twist.”
But it was not without its controversies. Fashion often riffs on the everyday, playing with items or looks that most people consider simply practical (see lanyards) or workwear (take hi-vis, for example). And fashion, understandably, is often criticised for either glamourising, deriding or engaging in a very surface way, with garments or looks that are tied up in class politics. Blokecore – with its fondness for items with history as the clothes of young working class men watching the footy – is no different.
Most dramatic pregnancy reveal: Rihanna
Remember when Beyoncé announced she was pregnant on Instagram in 2017 with a photo in which she was surrounded by a garden centre’s worth of flowers and a new era of exuberant pregnancy announcement began? From2023, that seems almost quaint. This year Rihanna waited until her half-time performance at the Super Bowl to reveal her second, her baby-bump cocooned in a red Loewe catsuit. It’s safe to say that never has a pregnancy reveal had such high ratings – or such talented backing dancers.
Most ‘fashion’ shoe: the Maison Margiela Tabi
It’s a crowded field. The Adidas Samba is everywhere. Meanwhile, Martine Rose’s Nike Shox took a classic football boot and made it fun, with shock absorbers and a colour clash vivid enough to make a highlighter blush. The 00s resurgence saw ballet flats back on feet. And at Balenciaga this month, trainers the size of naan bread cried out for attention.
But it is the split-toe Tabi that perhaps best sums up where the industry is at with shoes in 2023. Ugly footwear is now so mainstream that Crocs can be worn to weddings, so for those wanting to put a more fashion-foot forward, the ante needed to be upped. Enter the Tabi, which nosedives into the uncanny – footwear that is more hoof than heel.
Best red carpet look: Lil Nas X
Lil Nas X is not a man afraid of making a statement, but even for him this look – worn to the Met Gala in May – felt bold. The American musician took the signature pearls of Chanel, given the event was in honour of the late designer Karl Lagerfeld, and made them his own, adding talons and tiny pants for good measure.
Must do better: Kering
Kering, the second-largest luxury fashion group in the industry, became the focus of ire in the fashion industry over a lack of diversity when, in October, Seán McGirr was announced as Sarah Burton’s replacement at Alexander McQueen. With his appointment, all the creative directors at Kering – the group that owns McQueen, as well as Balenciaga and Gucci – were now white men.
But Kering is not alone in needing to do better. Of the top 30 luxury brands in the Vogue Business Index, only eight out of 33 creative director roles are held by women. With big jobs to be filled at some of the biggest luxury brands next year, all eyes will be on the appointments in the hope that something will shift.
Most attainable styling hack: the messy bag
An overstuffed bag resembling a Subway footlong sandwich became aspirational this year, thanks to Miu Miu and Bottega Veneta. It is that rare thing: a moment when fashion and real-life intersect with total harmony and the most current styling trick is one that you already do, without even trying. Fittingly, Jane Birkin, who died this year leaving a rich style legacy behind her, was a master of the look.
Best model pose: Maggie Smith
Leave it to a national treasure to accomplish what so many contenders on America’s Next Top Model failed to do: adopt the perfect part-relatable, part-aspirational shoot-ready expression. When the 88-year-old actor Dame Maggie Smith bagged Loewe’s spring/summer 2024 pre-collection campaign, it was hailed as part of a growing movement of older models in campaigns and fashion shoots. See also Martha Stewart, who became the oldest cover model in Sports Illustrated Swimsuit history when she appeared in this year’s issue at the age of 81.
Most ‘fashion’ decade: the 00s
The latest trend to make us feel old has seen low-slung trousers, Von Dutch baseball caps, tube tops and baby tees – the pure unadulterated maximalism of that new-millennia flush – bring all things 00s back into the fashion fold. On secondhand reseller Depop alone there were 8m listings for 00s fashion. Channel Paris Hilton in her Simple Life-era glory and you will look peak-2023, proving the 20-year trend cycle theory still holds some water.
Most ‘fashion’ animal: the lion
In another crowded field, the king of the jungle became the king of the catwalk this year when Daniel Roseberry debuted a Schiaparelli couture collection fit for the The Really Wild Show. Likenesses of snow leopards and wolves were all attached to dresses, but it was the golden mane of the lion, against a figure-hugging black dress, that stood out, especially when worn by Kylie Jenner to the show.
Discussion of whether the taxidermy-esque collection glorified trophy hunting ensued, but the real outrage should be reserved for the fashion industry’s continuing mistreatment of animals, which vocal animal rights activists Peta made a stand against this year, crashing catwalks from Coach to Burberry and Hermès, and calling the brands out for their use of exotic skins, leather and cashmere.
Special mention must also go to frogs, who made a catwalk appearance this year thanks to wellies at JW Anderson that resembled the face of the lovable pond-dweller. It was a blast of not unwelcome nostalgia for the 80s kids who wore them for splashing in muddy puddles before heading home to watch Home and Away.
Most improved garment: the baseball cap
The baseball cap, a perennial favourite for good reason, has had a particularly good year. It has been everywhere, from the heads of the 1%, when made out of cashmere and costing more than an average monthly gas bill, to off-duty actors, to … everyone. It has also been on a learning tip, with an intriguing and somewhat performative twist thanks to the litcore trend, which has seen the names of highbrow authors like Zadie Smith emblazoned on caps where more traditionally the New York Yankees insignia might sit.
Most-hyped fashion renaissance: Phoebe Philo
Even if you care nothing for clothes or who designs them, you would be hard-pushed not to have heard the name Phoebe Philo this year, uttered as it was with a level of excitement that is rarely heard from the jaded corridors of the fashion industry, “Hallelujah!” being a consensus reaction to the announcement that she would finally return with her eponymous label. The reaction was perhaps slightly more muted when the clothes finally did arrive – not because of any disappointment about the trenches and totes within, but because, unsurprisingly, the prices were sky high. £700 leggings, anyone?
