Fashion as an Information Cascade
https://qz.com/quartzy/1160897/why-isnt-streetwear-just-called-fashion/ Since the concept of fashion arose, trends in fashion — what is considered in style, new, or attractive and what is considered out of style, boring, or unattractive — have existed. However, for a trend in fashion to arise, there must be multiple people contributing to making it one. Additionally, as with most or all patterns, there needs to be an initial state or starting off point, which in this case would be the first person to wear the particular designer or article of clothing that is soon to become popular. Often times in society, people pay particular attention to the celebrities and famous people they are interested in, for a variety of reasons. As a result of this, the clothing these people wear are also of interest to the public, and especially those already intrigued by fashion to begin with. We acknowledge that the people wearing these outfits are just as important as the outfits themselves by coining the word “trendsetter”. Never will you hear an average joe referred to as a trendsetter. The criteria to be a trendsetter in the fashion world is to first and foremost have a great sphere of influence, and secondly, be able to market what you are wearing as cool, new, attractive, sexy, or a display of social status and wealth, or some combination of all of the previously mentioned ideas.
It is important to note that Information cascades can lead to non-optimal results and that they too are very fragile, even though they have the potential to product so much conformity. Once again we can see how well this definition fits the concept of fashion. There really is no optimal solution or best fashion-trend everyone can universally agree on, but often times later generations and those now older look back decades ago and question how a certain style could have possibly been popular. Examples of such instances include mullets, perms, bell-bottom jeans, tye-dye clothing, and extremely baggy jeans and hoodies. We can see the fragility in all of these trends because of how short-lived they are. All it takes is one prominent celebrity to denounce a clothing brand or certain style, and the repercussions will be felt around the fashion community here at Cornell without a doubt. As time goes on, it is more and more likely for the trend to fade / die.
In particular, all of this can be applied to the recent interest in the fashion trend called streetwear popularized by many rappers including Nigo. Rap is the most widely listened to genre globally for the past year and 2018 has been a huge role for the rap community in terms of albums dropping. Rappers have been known to buy expensive brands because they can, in other words to show off wealth and status. The majority of these brands were streetwear labels, which can now be found styled by most nearly every guy, and at a fraction of the price if going to the right local store. Part of what caused streetwear to catch on so uniformity was the sheer number of people that listen to rap artists, along with their constant “flexing”. It can be argued that many people only buy it for the exclusivity and hype, and thus not the quality or graphics. This goes to illustrate just how fragile this massive branch is, should a few rappers claim that Gucci or Yeezys or Supreme, as mentioned in the article, is not longer cool or exciting. On the other hand, if no one says anything negative, the brand popularity naturally continues in the meantime.