Fashion. A word that defines a world in itself. Fashion encloses everything surrounding our environment. There is fashion everywhere. From the pen that a person uses to write to the paper that is used to write on. But more than anything, fashion is about how we dress up and cover our bodies. Fashion is an art, a passion and a science. The art of transforming mere fabrics into clothing and fabulous creations. A passion that drives people to think out of the box and design garments that make our daily if not special occasions more beautiful.
A science about how the body works, reacts with and looks in it. But today in 2013, more than ever, Fashion has power. Enough power to make a whole population think and consider. And the future seems brighter for Fashion and it gets stronger and stronger. By 2020 Fashion will… According to sic-if movies, spandex suits will be the norm. Uniformity will be the new trend. Same suit every day. Basically gloomy and no fashion anywhere. But uniformity is also boring if repeatedly everyone wears the same outfit and that too everyday. And generally speaking not everyone will look nice in spandex.
Fortunately designers such as Guiltier for the Fifth Element painted a different futuristic fashion. This is according to the movies. According to me, it will be the opposite. People will thrive to be different and non-conformity will be respected, if not individuality. Designers will have more respect as consumers will be more conscious about who designed the garment, where it is manufactured and how. People will have more awareness about what they wear and also the impact it implies. Consumers will start having their own vision and will even start creating.
Designing will be a highly regarded profession and this will be the only point that will differentiate professionalism. Cut, fabrics and techniques. With this will eventually come a more dignified consumer behavior. The need for something exclusive will grow even more. Things are not going to be made for the masses much longer. They will be made for you, individuals. There is a new obsession with the in-between. The latest ‘squelched’ of fashion. If future fashion was to be summed up in a word, that would be androgynous.
Anyone, or anything, who pushed the boundaries of sexual identity seemed to click the right notes. What was once seen as freakish, and even taboo, has gone mainstream. The fashion world is obsessed with androgyny. An ability to exude both masculine and feminine traits is like gold to designers and editors. And they do create a buzz and consumers are sure to remember. The vogue for unisex fashion – Oxford shirts, man-style brogues and boat shoes, chinos, military Jackets and skinny shares – has also been touted as one of the reasons for the rise in popularity of transgender style.
Ambiguity is something that attracts… As fresh materials become harder to come by and/or less sustainable, the need to recycle existing fabrics becomes more important. Already recycling is gaining a lot of ground and some impasses are making special collections bearing recycling in mind. Some independent designers are already making a big name by converting simple things of daily life into marvelous creations which are actually wearable. This trend will continue on till the forthcoming years and will become bigger as designers really think now that there is a niche for recycling.
People will be very much concerned about the environment. This generation will also be more close to the environment. Ethical behavior and moral in terms of production and consumption will be valuable assets. True value and mere cost will be two different things. People will want better quality and the question will be more quality-wise more than ever. The go green concept will be stronger than ever. With the changes in the climate and temperatures reaching phenomenal points, this generation will be most concerned about the environment and fashion will undoubtedly play a big role for the people.
This will show their support towards sustainability. Researches about environment friendly materials are also being made and notable breakthrough already is the discovery of bacterial-celluloses fibers to replace fibers from plants or animals. A statement. Already big companies like Inedited have signed the convention for chemical free production starting from 2020. Is that a sign of the rising responsiveness of both consumers and producers’since a long time ago there were lots of predictions for the year 2000.
Spandex suit, end of the world, flying cars, end of the world but ultimately, nothing that drastic has happened. The black little dress will still be the black little dress. Only the shell will change. The environment around us is changing, and our fashion can respond to that in artful or informative ways. Definitely Science and Fashion will be a winning team or 2020. There will be a strong collaboration with technological advances and researches. The current dominance of cotton and polyester fibers in the market is unsustainable; together they account for over 80% of the world’s clothing output.
This lack of diversity has led to growing problems such as excessive water consumption, pollution, loss of soil fertility and biodiversity and an over dependency on oil. Fabrics that offer innovative alternatives are part of a better future – one in which we are able to manage our resources wisely and cost effectively. Changes will occur in the trials used to make the garments. Already the introduction of artificial fibers and improvement in the production of existing fibers such as cotton and wool has already made it easier.
Nanotechnology advances will also play a major role for fashioning the future. Already the heat sensitive fabrics, sweat absorbing micrometers have changed a lot in the mindset of people and now we know that there does exist a way where fashion and science can bond. Where a surface meets the sun, solar energy can be captured. Already, brands such as Unique have been dabbling in tech-enhanced looting, such as the retailer’s Hatched tops and leggings made from material that turns moisture evaporating from the body into heat.
Almost any amount of electronic functionality can be associated with something without necessarily affecting its form. The human body is no different, and plenty of fashion designers have hopped on board this growing technology. More researches are being conducted to make clothing fabrics to become more technologically innovative, responsive and effective. Later on our clothing will become like ‘second-skin’ mostly protecting us and making us more comfortable. From room temperature to sounds and even tastes. Not Just this, researches being made are already making it clear that fashion can help to create energy.
Scientists are making big steps towards developing a shirt that can help convert our daily energy used to move into electricity to power electronic devices. We are the energy. Technological advances in textile research are starting to redefine the boundaries of fashion. There is also the other side of science-fashion mix. The more drastic ones. The ones that will drastically change our habits and even the clothing industry. The ‘Fabric’ s as the name suggests, nearly as fabric in a can. How to use it’simply Just spray it on the body. Manuel Tortes did trials and it worked perfectly.
Non woven fabrics will be later used to cover our bodies. The thousands of fibers that are sprayed from the can Just bind together taking the shape of the body to create a nearly tailor made outfit but of a disposable nature. Such researches will surely revolutionize the world of fashion. After the term fast-food’, fast-fashion’ seems to be on the way. This is the craziest and perhaps most expensive side of Fashion’s ongoing progress. Ever heard of the Twitter dress, LED dress or the AD printed dress worn by Data Von These? The Twitter dress and LED was developed by Francesca Rosella.
Basically everyone got the message or rather the tweet’. Fashion and Technology are the new couple. But unmistakably, the biggest breakthrough is the AD printed dress, showing that wearable technology is Just around the corner. AD printing technology is still in its infancy, but it has already made its way to the world of fashion. Everything from shoes to bikinis have gone under the lathe off AD printer. AD printers are actually renters that print using resin instead of ink on paper. Obviously this is a work of art and it is so visible to the eye.
The process already looks very confusing and the huge amount of work put in it can be felt. Going the different parts, ‘powdered nylon’. Architecturally mind-blowing. The cost is certainly unimaginable but some designers have tried it out and nylon being not so expensive, the design is certainly not cheap but is worth it and for the individuality perk. Research for the near future will be to have this kind of a printer that will Just pop out the design as a complete piece. Designers of the mainstream typical futuristic fashion scene such as Iris Van Herpes inspire.
She always give a glimpse of her world, the unknown and the unpredictable. These designers are helping to shape the future of fashion by experimenting and helping the industry to take the big leap. Hopefully the AD printing technique will see significant breakthroughs that will help to make it a more accessible and viable way to create clothing. Fashion in the 2020 will be more likely functional as well as creative and environment friendly. Some future designs won’t be as functional as they will be visually impacting, but such has always been true about the clothes we wear.
And only fashion can make anything beautiful and valuable. Examples are LED dresses with encrusted lights. This is a notable inspiration for other designers and it is very refreshing to get inspiration from other eras of the time except from the past. Fashion sometimes needs to change its face, Just to be more inspiring. It is testament to the power of fashion that Google chose the US designer Diane von Frequenter’s New York show last year to premiere its Google Glass augmented-technology specs hat feature cameras and use voice recognition and share their videos on Google+.
Social media is very anchored in the fashion world now. Using social media in the fashion world comes down to more than Just what designers share on Mainstream and coverage of Fashion Week. It is becoming more and more about consumer directly connecting with the brands as well as with each other. Sites like Power allow its users to check out the latest trends and create style boards for their own inspiration as well as to share with the rest of the fashion community. Change is certainly in the air and there are some concrete evidences.
The changing mentality of consumers, producers and designers, the amazing advances in technology and the continuous enriching history of our world, all are contributing towards a ‘different future’. But I soon realized that the future fashions are only a perception of the future. When I look back fifty years at what the previous generation thought the future (now the present) would be like, it is vastly different from our time. Everything seems a filtered down versions from fantasy, to designer, to high street. Because that does happen and it is a mere shadow of the former design, something hat hardly resembles this aesthetic at all.
As I say, the little black dress will remain the little black dress. I’m talking about a drastic change in fashion’s aesthetic, something that will inevitably happen, Just as it has over the centuries. Only time will be witness to the changes if any will occur, and drastic as well. Predictions are Just as trends some might Just hit the bull’s eyes others are Just brushed aside with a scorn. The most ironic thing is that none of us will ever know what the distant future holds and what the progression, even evolution of fashion will bring.
