Ballet Flats, Blazers and Brexit

One can only hope that the recent revival of 2016’s fashion trends and mood is ironic. 

Throughout the 2010s, British fashion was largely casual, often erring on the side of slouchy. From all corners of the nation grandparents feigned concern for the chilly knees of their grandchildren and teens sported hoodies in heatwaves: ripped jeans and logo heavy sportswear dominated the period. 

Vogue noticed, and they gave it a name. The 'casualification' of British fashion. The rise in athleisure and streetwear in everyday wear signalled a sentiment of looseness, of ease. Over the past five years, such a uniform has quietly unravelled. Slouch has fallen by the wayside. The Union Jack prints and pinstripe leggings that once felt ‘in’, now read as loud and ironic,  revived occasionally by a brazen Central Saint Martins student, but nowhere to be seen near a Zara.

There has already been analysis linking this shift to conservative politics and the renewed fashionability of thinness during economic downturns. These explanations are necessary. But one factor is consistently overlooked in British cultural analysis: Brexit.

My generation was indelibly marked by the decision to leave the European Union not only economically, but culturally. Our curriculum demanded compulsory language lessons that came with the promise of European mobility. Many of us were teenagers on the cusp of the Brexit referendum, watching slightly older siblings and peers benefit from Erasmus. We glimpsed a continental life that we assumed we would one day share. But on 31st January 2020, these doors closed for us. Is it any wonder, then, that the trendsetting cohort of young women in their early twenties is now leaning into a more overtly European aesthetic? After all, we brushed against a European ideal that we now have no access to.

We like to pretend that in the 2010s, we were free from the pervasive influence of social media's fast fashion propaganda - TikTok shop, Amazon Storefronts - but this isn't remotely true. We learnt how to dress online. The typical 2010 teen began with Zoella, before graduating to Kylie Jenner, maybe even to Molly-Mae depending on which corner of the internet they found themselves on. We can track this shift in the latter: Molly Mae's transition from graphic hoodies to Matilda Djerf-esque tailored blazers neatly captures this turn. 

Our relationship with Europe was a matter David Cameron hoped to put to bed in 2016, but it is one that has seemingly been up all night ever since. In truth, it was never particularly suited to an early bedtime. The Financial Times traces British Euroscepticism back to Thatcher, but some may argue it was embedded from the outset, a relationship defined less by partnership than by suspicion. And yet, despite a popular vote borne out of it, this Euroscepticism has never quite prevailed. We have attempted to give Europe the cold shoulder, but the gesture has never held. 

Recent events, namely Trump's wildly unpredictable posturing over Greenland, reminds us of its geopolitical importance to the United Kingdom. Europe is both strategically significant and culturally inescapable. As much as Brits may claim to hate the French (and those of my generation don’t really know why we repeat this refrain, only that it would feel very un-British not to), disengagement is not possible. The stripes of the marinière shall always be in.

It is undeniable that recent fashion trends in particular have seen the revival of Parisian elegance. Whilst its problematic emphasis on thin silhouettes deserves critique, especially since research connects these aesthetics with economic instability, perhaps it also signals something deeper: a subconscious rejection of Trump-era aesthetics. A turn away from the oversized, hyper-commercialised, processed-America look toward the more refined, restrained, and storied visuals of continental Europe. A GlobeNewswire study projects that the European luxury market will be an $85+ Billion Industry by 2030, and Robb Report finds a 93% appreciation in the value of the Birkin bag over the past decade. We are hearing the names of European retailers more than ever before: Sezane, Ganni, Samsøe Samsøe, ba&ash. And the ballet flats I once begged my mum to buy me for school are now the pinnacle of the cool girl aesthetic. 

I admit this analysis is largely instinctive. I have no qualifications in fashion or social analysis. But I do have a lot of clothes. I also, like many who were just too young to vote in the Brexit referendum (yet are the most impacted by it) possess a yearning to rejoin the EU, even if just so that the 7 years I spent agonising over French grammar can be put to some good use. The cosplaying of Euro-chic feels symptomatic of something, rather than merely incidental. If I spot Macron in a Fred Perry polo and Barber jacket, or Mathilda Djerf in a Superdry tracksuit, then I will feel vindicated. I will sleep well at night knowing that Europe misses us too.

Image: Flickr/Foreign, Commonwealth, and Development Office (Patrick Demarchelier)

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