The noughties: Gen Z are too young to truly remember them and millennials are just far away enough from them to have got over them. Following the received wisdom of trend forecasters, whose rule of thumb states that fashion trends follow 20 year cycles (give or take a couple of years), it’s only right that 00s references are ripe for the picking.
Today, the bare bones of the 90s lie gleaming white, fashion and culture vultures having picked them clean of every last scrap of cultural relevance. We’ve all collectively screeched over the Spice Girls, gone to 90s R’n’B nights, and started wearing Champion sweaters again. We’ve had platform trainers, minimalist styling, contrasting lip liner, crop tops and Clueless. The only bit left on the decade’s carcass is the genre of ska-punk, and we all must pray that remains a distant memory.
But just as in 2010, 90s fashion was the perfect balance of nostalgia and rejection of the prevailing aspirational ideal (i.e. Rachel Zoe’s tanned and bony grip on celebrity style), now as we approach 2020, 00s fashion hits the same saccharine high. 2000s style is two decades of nostalgia mixed with the rejection of our current prevailing aspirational ideal following the last decade of austerity policies: our fashion mindset is somewhat subdued, values ‘inconspicuous’ good taste, and is relatable.
Early 00s fashion, however, is obnoxious: it’s Mean Girls squeals turned up to 11, and brash like a diamanté knuckle duster. It is the casual, spoiled kid who’s allowed a McDonalds to eat in the car on the way home. It is conspicuous consumption for the new Millennium, the flashy logos of a bratty teenager combined with the insolence of loungewear. The increasing rehabilitation of 2000s fashion tropes has been creeping under the radar, sneaking into catwalks and collections for the last few years. I, for one, hail our diamanté fashion overlord, Ed Hardy.
As 14-year-old girls scour Depop for used Von Dutch, we look back at six moments that signalled the 00s fashion renaissance was on an inevitable collision course with earth.
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