The Ins And Outs Of Streetwear Fashion

There are many different fashions out there in the world today. Some are old and timeless, some are known and considered ‘fast fashion’ that can be obtained for a smaller price tag, some are antiques, some are influenced by celebrity culture. Like high street fashion, designer brands, sportswear trends or hip hop, these are all fashion genres that are easy to label. Yet, there’s one fashion trend that can be difficult to define.

Streetwear is a style crafted, constantly updated and forever stamped in the fashion history books by consumers themselves. Unlike other trends that are influenced by editors, designers and fashion icons around the world, streetwear is created by the people and cannot be categorized in one neat box as there are many different types of streetwear across the globe.

Below, we’ll take a look at the most common streetwear fashion styles that have emerged across the world, from as early as the 60’s to modern day today.

Common Characteristics Of Streetwear

While streetwear is a difficult fashion trend to define, there are some common characteristics that deem clothing as streetwear. Let’s take a look at some of these below.

Comfort

If there’s only two traits you could use to define all streetwear, it would be comfy and athletic. Streetwear consists of items of clothing that are soft and easy to move around in. If you couldn’t do something active in the clothes, then it’s probably not streetwear.

Uniqueness

Streetwear isn’t something you would find in a local mall chain store or see lots of people wearing the same item while walking around the city. Streetwear pieces are uniquely crafted and are rare to come across. This means they are not mass produced but are lovingly designed and passionately displayed by artistic soles.

Gender Preferences

While in today’s world, anyone can wear streetwear regardless of what gender they identify as, in previous decades where gender fashion was not as fluid it was more typical to see streetwear aligned with men’s fashion.

A Work of Art

Many consider streetwear to be contemporary are. Pieces often have a design or logo that was created to mock classic art or make a bold statement that challenges societal norms. As such, it is a style that is mostly associated with younger people.

The Different Types Of Streetwear

Now that we’ve identified the common characteristics of streetwear, let’s take a look at some different types of this fashion trend.

Urban Streetwear

Urban streetwear has close ties to New York City in the 80’s and 90’s. A key cultural component of this branch of streetwear is that it is closely tied with hip hop and as such, was an edgy type of wear that was baggy, easy to move in, and often made a statement. This was the age where streetwear was truly unique and not yet highly commercialized.

One of the key components of urban streetwear was stacked fit sweatpants, in which they’re still an iconic style for hip hop dancers today.  Stacked sweats offer a cool look while also providing comfort. They’re a timeless piece that will most likely be on the fashion scene for decades to come.

Sneaker Culture

Sneaker culture describes urban streetwear once it became commercialized. Since the 70’s major brands like Nike, Adidas and Puma have caught on and used this trend to grow their brands and increase profits. Many times, these brands will create limited edition lines or sneaker models where there are only a handful available.

These lines are then sold for a very high retail price and can be difficult for consumers to get their hands on due to high demand. While this means that urban streetwear is commercialized, it also enables brands to keep the integrity of the trend by only releasing a limited amount of a unique design.

Overall, streetwear fashion can be difficult to define since it is continually created and being evolved by consumers across the world. However, this only makes it more exciting and more in demand than many other fashion trends out there