Author: Ben Tuthill
2012 was menswear’s coming out year. I don’t mean that like coming out of the closet – though I sort of do (see Jian DeLeon’s article “Is Menswear ‘Gay’ Again?” for a mostly thoughtful treatment of that issue) – but coming out in the way a debutante comes out. Menswear stepped out of the internet and made its debut in society this year. Men across the country started thinking about their clothes in a borderline serious way, and the effects are cropping up everywhere you go. I See You, Occidental underclassmen tucking in your shirts. There are about four of you. You all look great.
Menswear’s rise to prominence brought with it flamboyance and high-speed turnover at rates previously only seen in women’s fashion. Men’s fashion has always been defined by its slow progression, but 2012 saw a leap in what men were willing to wear and how fast they were willing to buy it. Trends popped up, pushed limits, and fell out of prominence within weeks. Everything got faster and brighter. This was the year classic stopped being classic and started being boring. This was the year of creepers and monster ripple soles. This was the year rappers started wearing Givenchy and Rick Owens. This was the year Hawaiian shirts started to be taken seriously.
This was the year of Lawrence Schlossman. Not only did Schlossman reveal himself as the formerly anonymous co-creator of the sort-of-ironic-but-not-really blog/book deal “[Oh] Yeah Menswear,” but he also assembled the biggest douchebags in menswear and started the sort-of-ironic-but-not-really website “Four Pins.” “Four Pins” applies the hype-machine pace and hip-hop slang of streetwear blogging to traditional #menswear topics like Vibram soles and Pitti Uomo street style.
Schlossman knows that men in the internet age want the newest and the flashiest, and he has a knack for getting a hold of the next big thing and making you feel bad for not finding it first. “Four Pins” stepped up the speed of #menswear and brought a level of frantic consumerism that the old guard heritage nerds were never able to create, and all the mom-and-pop bloggers are still scrambling to keep up.
This was the year of the Nike Flyknit Scandal. In late July, just before the Olympics, Nike revealed the Flyknit Trainer, the fluorescent light-weight running shoe that you saw on the feet of every US athlete in London. No one was more excited about this than #menswear. “Four Pins” broke the story, the other blogs caught on, photos were Tumbld and Instagrammed in seizure-inducing quantities, accusations of trendiness spread like wildfire, and before Usain Bolt won the 200 “Four Pins” reported back that the Flyknit had been “killed by menswear.” It was the fastest boom-bust cycle in men’s fashion history, and the moment #menswear finally got up to speed with the rest of the web.
This was the year that the internet finally killed street style. #Everyone have been saying it for years, but this year Real Everyone figured it out: street style is a joke. No one is fooling anyone anymore: every fashionista knows where to be photographed, every photographer knows where to catch the fashionistas, everybody pretends to not notice the cameras and everyone pretends that their favorite picture of a guy on a bike in a tunic wearing velvet slippers while smoking a cigarette is completely organic. The New York Times printed an article in September that forced the commercialization of street style blogging to the forefront, but no one was too surprised. The best shot this year: Ulyana Sergeenko, wearing an over-the-top velvet gown and a self-aware smile that’s equal parts saintly and smug, surrounded by a mob of photographers scrambling to get a photo. Everyone knew this was coming. An art form can only stay pure for so long in a place like the internet.
This was the year that made-in-USA refused to die. Small Business Saturday became a corny but widely recognized thing. NorthenGRADE expanded to Chicago, and Pop Up Flea came back for a fifth year. All-American online shops Made Collection and Inland Clothing opened to much fanfare. American hero Michael Williams got quoted in a major newspaper on an almost weekly basis. Harry Reid demanded that Chinese-made clothes be piled up and burned after the Olympic uniform scandal. So what if bloggers have turned to Nikes and fast-fashion paced trends? So what if the internet hates integrity? The American Heritage movement stands strong. Here, on the brink of global economic collapse, menswear is still intent on saving the world.
It just has to calm down a bit. It went too far this year. It showed off, it had fun, it was the star of the show. But the party can’t last forever. Menswear had its cotillion, but now it’s time to settle in, slow down, and get responsible. The days of fluorescent shoes and floral shorts are over. Welcome to 2013.
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