Labelmakers: The Fashion and Status of a New Generation
Graphic by Ruth Ellen Berry.
When you think of luxury fashion, chances are you imagine Chanel’s interlocking C’s or Louis Vuitton’s iconic logo pattern. Top designer labels have such a pervasive reputation of luxury that visually branding their clothing guarantees it will sell. These days, branding is even more distinct, with larger, bolder fonts. In the last decade, as athleisure’s popularity has risen, companies increasingly use luxury logos to drive up the price of a simple piece of clothing.
Take for example a nondescript, blue cotton sweatsuit. Would you pay $399 for the pants alone? You might scoff at the thought, wondering who would ever pay that much for sweatpants. But put “Versace” down the leg in big white letters, and now a customer will buy these because they send a message: these are not ordinary sweatpants.
Why are companies shifting toward increased visibility of branding? And is this shift correlated with a change in our societal habits and values?
To answer these questions, I had to look no further than my smartphone. Social media platforms such as Instagram have only been around since Generation Z was in middle school, but with them came a whole host of new standards surrounding prestige and validation.
Labels are at the root of these new standards. Listing your accolades in your Instagram bio, getting a lot of likes and being verified have all become normalized on social media. They reveal a significant change in the power of labels to influence how we perceive one another––they show the world who we are, where we’ve been and what we have.
Fashion trends are reflections of shifts in our culture. Just as athleisure represents an American society that is increasingly on-the-go and Y2K reveals our nostalgia for another time, the increase in brand visibility stems from a desire to control our narrative, which social media allows us to carefully curate.
But are these changes to our fashion and culture permanent?
We’ll just have to wait and see.
