A useful fashion compendium of the faces, labels and looks to know this season
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An A-Z of this year’s fashion moments, from activism to zero tolerance and everything in between. Get into it
It’s been a while since a New York runway show generated the level of anticipation Raf Simons’ Calvin Klein debut did. Only one runway show into his new job and he’s already injected a shot of energy into the US Fashion Week calendar and won two CFDA Awards for Womenswear and Menswear Designer of The Year.
E
is everyone’sfor.… invited A is for… activism
Last season’s slogan tee has morphed into this season’s protest banner – or, in the case of Missoni, a runway recreation of the Women’s March, complete with pussyhats. Whether your cause is women’s rights, racial equality or climate change, there’s a T-shirt for that.
D
is for…
dapper dan
f is for… feathers
b
g is for... galactic K is for… knits H heritageprintsis for…
i is for… L is for…
J
m
is for... N P
pis four...rple O is for… the office
Q
is for… R is for… red s
is for...
V is for… vêtements
y
is for...
youthquake
t is for…
U X
x-rated is for…
Z zero tolerance is for…
Nine-to-five workwear was without a doubt one of the season’s biggest trends. Céline, Calvin Klein, Stella McCartney and Victoria Beckham are on the long list of designers who served up trouser suits, career coats, double-breasted blazers and more.
Pantone’s colour of the year is Greenery, but you’d never know that from all the shades of lilac and lavender on the runways. Purple is often used to communicate royalty, power, wealth, and it’s meant to calm the mind and convey spirituality. Make of...
The duvet coat isn’t going away. We’re currently eyeing up Preen’s oversized floral beauty.
Designer musical chairs continues: Clare Waight Keller is at Givenchy, Natacha Ramsay-Levi is at Chloé, Luke and Lucie Meier have taken over the reins at Jil Sander, while Serge Ruffieux is now at Carven.
mash-up artists From our trend-report specialist Siduations to the Rihannaendorsed Freddie Made, there’s a wave of new Instas reimagining runway looks with Photoshop. Here are four of the best to follow.
Cherry boots, crimson dresses, scarlet lips – they’re all happening. And there’s a look for everyone: bombshell hot (Versace), avant garde (Comme des Garçons), regal (Roksanda), coquettish (Chloé) and more.
shearling
We’re elevating the shearling coat to the ELLE Hall of Fame of timeless investment buys. There’s a reason it appears on runways year after year. Buy it once, wear it forever.
Wouldn’t life be easy if we could live on another planet? When current events look rather underwhelming, sometimes it’s helpful to fantasise about the future. It might explain the rise of forward-thinking space references that showed up everywhere from...
Let’s be clear: these never, ever, five more evers, go out of style. This time around, though, the heritage prints go hand in hand with the rise of power dressing: a trouser suit in Prince of Wales check, as seen at Calvin Klein, a voluminous jumpsuit...
is for… jonathan anderson Whether it was the Loewe Puzzle
or the J.W.Anderson Pierce, it was difficult to walk two steps in New York, London, Milan and Paris
Fashion Weeks without seeing one of Jonathan Anderson’s bags.
The Nineties Dior logo is a thing again, thanks to creative director Maria Grazia Chiuri and brand ambassador Rihanna, who has been carrying the bags all year.
Ribbed, Fair Isle, homespun crochet, bejewelled and embroidered – you name it, chances are your sweater of dreams exists this season.
There was a luxe, slightly wacky sense of fun running through the season. That’s mostly down to the bold colour combinations, which often came in large shapes and dramatic textures. Our favourite example of this: Miu Miu’s camp, kaleidoscopic,...
Plus-size, over-50, Muslim, Latina, Asian, black, Indian – the AW17 runways were the most diverse the fashion world has seen in decades. Breakthrough model Halima Aden epitomised the new spirit.
If an Eighties pop group merged with a Noughties R&B band, they’d be close to recreating fashion’s
new ‘flash’. Proof: the crystal bodysuits at Gucci, glittery heels at Isabel Marant and bejewelled boots at Saint Laurent. The glitterati are back.
is...
Somewhere, a flock of ostriches want their tails back. After appearing on everything from dresses to pyjamas for SS17, the trend has picked up steam for AW17: Alexander McQueen, Marni, J.W.Anderson, Sonia Rykiel, Dolce & Gabbana, Prada – the list goes...
Before Vêtements started knocking off DHL and Ikea, and Gucci started ‘counterfeiting’ itself, a man named Dapper Dan became a Harlem legend by creating his own version of luxury fashion looks (complete with designer logos) back in the Eighties. His...
Call it the decade of the moment, with Marc
Jacobs, Miu Miu, Mulberry and Prada all reimagining the Seventies. The look involves a throwback colour palette of burnt orange,
tan, tobacco and yellow, as well as flamboyant, outsized shapes (big and...
@jamespscully Casting director James Scully sparked a small revolution during the Paris shows when he began naming and shaming brands and casting agents who allegedly mistreat models. A string of Supers including Helena Christensen, Joan Smalls,...
western
is for… Fashion wants you to go west, young (wo)man – as in, pull out your cowboy boots and denim jackets. House of Holland, Ashley Williams, Alexander Wang, Yeezy, Coach and Calvin Klein all referenced the old US days of prairies, ranch...
Fashion’s favourite disrupters continue to question the system. This time, Vêtements dropped off the fashion calendar altogether after moving from the Paris Fashion Week women’s ready-to-wear to the couture schedule in 2016.
utopia
is for… In the midst of the season’s political statements, designers such as Comme des Garçons and Undercover created imagined worlds, encouraging us to look at the bright side and seek otherworldly beauty.
Matty Bovan and Mimi Wade are leading a new wave of fashion graduates making an impression among London’s editors and buyers. They’re all bound by their inclusion in Fashion East, British fashion’s alternate breeding ground for new names to know.
AW17 featured mostly coveredup looks (long dresses, big coats, voluminous trousers), but those sheer, nipple-baring tops and short leather dresses at Saint Laurent are etched into our brains forever.