Dude, it’s time. Girls, you too. Time to pack up the whole in-your-face, raw, hyper-sexualized, porno, skater, white trash, open wounds, self-effacing, Jackass, loose ethics, 80’s bar mitzvah disco, and party-till-you vomit movement, aesthetic and attitude. Go on, scram. Beat it. We don’t want you hanging around anymore. For those of us that saw this Larry Clark inspired tsunami coming, we all thought Terry Richardson was on to something fun (in 2000) and we all laughed our asses off at Vice’s fashion do’s and don’ts (in 2002… ok, ok… they’re still pretty funny). Ed Templeton represented on the West Coast. And for a nanosecond it seemed like that colosal wanker Dov Charney was going to breathe some eros into the deadly boring billboards and newspaper back covers of our nation’s cities. Ya Ya Ya… we thought.

But it’s all over now you beautiful losers. The schtick just comes off as stupid and done. Your hip, modern, rough-hewn, brainless, urban nihilism has been handed over to marketers and sold to the suburbs. Tired. Tired. Ti-erd. Like disco in the 70’s you never had any substance to begin with, and you thought that would make you safe. But it hasn’t. Your fashion clock has stopped ticking. And don’t try to pretty things up with your pastels and your five sizes too small dandy suits either. Just take your little terrycloth short shorts, your limited edition Ryan Mcginley skateboard, your two months at Parsons (before you got kicked out), your ketamine, your tube socks, and your three legged cat, and just go. Try to have the decency to fade into the night and be remembered by your own kids in twenty years. God knows you took enough pictures. They’ll be yawning at yet another flash-saturated shot of you getting your boobs sucked by strangers in a crowded Brooklyn bar.

Please. Go. Stop clinging on. Make way for something new. Evolve.

OK, you can keep the hot pants.

Gleefully stolen from Gazpachot.

The low-rise jean fetish. We’ve seen girls showing the g-string, both intentionally, and embarrasingly unintentionally, but some guys take it to a new low – never mind the pun.

Allow me to clarify. This is the outfit. Neck to waist: T-shirt. Waist to genitalia/anus: underpant. Genitalia to ankles: jeans. The notion of an undergarment has been jettisoned. The pant is out there. The buttocks are all but open to the wind. Both cheeks. Top to bottom. For the trouser, this is truly a new low.

How is it that the plumber’s crack has made it into mainstream fashion? Do we have Mark Wahlberg and his Calvins to blame? I certainly don’t care what brand boxers you’re wearing – so, why not try pulling your jeans up where they should be and covering up your pimply, unsightly arse. William Sutcliffe with more.

Whilst I’m a self-confessed Adidas fan with Onitsuka trailing far behind in second, I have to say that these Nike kicks aren’t bad at all. The Nike D-Town Air Max 90 was released to accompany the 2005 MLB All Star game, with this years All Star game taking place at Comerica Park in Detroit.

White and blue, with a textured weave across the toe and the most impressive 313 area code print.

That said, you wont catch me trading in a pair of my Superstars.

The photographer Helmut Newton transformed fashion into a form of erotica. With his long-legged models shot from below and lit like goddesses carved out of stone, Newton’s vision of women was both threatening and compelling. Through his lens, sexuality was transformed into power.

Yesterday, Newton died in a car crash on Sunset Boulevard yesterday, aged 83.

It seems that I got under someone’s skin today. That’s something different. Since this is my blog, I can say what I like. Here’s a copy of the letter with which I replied to Holly Lloyd-McDonald, fashion reporter from the stellar publication – The Herald Sun.

Dear Holly,

Thank you for you response. As someone who works in an office as such and has worked across both corporate and (advertising) agency environments for just a few years, I would have to disagree in saying that over the past two to three years the swing has been towards a more casual feel.

In my and many others opinion, the suit saw the peak of its decline in the year 2000. Late in 2000 heralded the start of the return to corporate wear, the suit.

This was due to the casual nature that many dotcom and related firms took to dressing. Erstwhile, their failure issued a statement that the casual mode was out, and the charcoal pinstripe was back.

Notwithstanding this, I quote – “The suit has become a style icon which can transport the wearer from taking the kids to school before a work breakfast meeting to a longwinded boardroom conference to a spectacular dinner date, all within the space of a day and without adjusting a single button.”

The rationale behind such commentary is that you may as well have stated that one plus one equals two.

As a journalist, you are paid to provide ‘information’ and in turn you will of course take criticism, whether it be constructive or otherwise.

That said, I’m completely open to thoughts by others, and in the medium in which I do write (not limited to this website) I have the ability for others, such as yourself to provide return commentary.

Regards,
Benn

P.S. I’ll note that today I’m wearing a bespoke suit and shirt, cuff links and silk tie with a half Windsor knot. That indeed sounds like corporate casual, otherwise I would have been wearing a morning suit today.

As further fuel for the fire, I could well post the email that by a certain media head to his organisation at one point last year that stated that if you weren’t dressed properly (ie. suit), you would be down at Centrelink in a very short amount of time.

You have to ‘love’ those trashy, testosterone fuelled magazines like Ralph and Ice. Here’s some classic commentary from MB’s ‘resident fashionista’ Holly Lloyd-McDonald.

She tells us that the suit, apparently, is “back”. “The suit has become a style icon which can transport the wearer from taking the kids to school before a work breakfast meeting to a longwinded boardroom conference to a spectacular dinner date, all within the space of a day and without adjusting a single button.”

What a smart lass. Next she’ll be telling us the lace-up brogue or perhaps, the wingtip is back in vogue next summer. How’s black looking? Perhaps, charcoal?

Where do I go? What do I wear? What do I drink? These are all the important questions that are being asked by those non-raver types who want to be ravers.

I didn’t realise that Lenny Kravitz was so important to the rave scene in 1991 though.