Normcore

There’s a recent re-focus in fashion. If you’ve watched the street-style lenses of Tommy Ton or The Sartorialist, you’ve noticed that there’s a presence becoming more and more noticeable, the normcore fashionista. Normcore, in essence, is a movement characterized by wearing unassuming, un-pretentious, average looking clothing. It’s a characteristically Parisian move, with a laid-back aesthetic championed by the likes of Isabel Marant. The main core is that it’s not about the clothes, it’s about how you wear them.

But let’s go back in time, to an era when “normcore” was only really worn by the “working class”. Anybody with any status wouldn’t be seen dead in a basic, and the focus was on the tailor-made, the luxurious and the accessorized. This all faded like a pair of good jeans with the introduction of stars like Brando and Dean. For the entirety of a Streetcar named Desire, Brando is shown in a basic t-shirt tucked into a pair of well worn jeans, and the only accessory James Dean ever wore was his leather jacket. This simple style made them the icons they are today. It’s similar to the changes nowadays, with the introduction of ripped jeans and casually rolled t-shirts challenging the tailored pant and over-the-top shirt. 

More importantly, normcore is signaling a change in which we perceive the style Gods: we don’t see them as Gods any more. What many a person flipping through Vogue or Harper’s Bazaar forgets is that all of those people are human. They may be dressed in something more expensive or rare, but they all have their little problems, their friends, their families. Anna Wintour may be Queen of the fashion world, but she wakes up every morning and goes to bed every evening no different than the rest of us. The thing that defines her are her actions; which, as mentioned, is the core of normcore. Though I’m sure we won’t be seeing her in an American Apparel store any time soon, the future Wintour is already there, in a rolled-up t shirt, jeans, and a mind full of possibilities.  

Trench from Burberry

T-Shirt from American Apparel

Jeans from H&M

Shoes by Converse