FashionBritons amplify to TV shows for lockdown fashion inspirationAn increasing number of companies have started to announce official merchandise for followers
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A Killing Eve-inspired fashion range is incoming. Photograph: Landmark Expedient/AlamyA Killing Eve-inspired fashion range is incoming. Photograph: Landmark Media/AlamyPriya ElanFri 20 Aug 2021 12.52 BSTLast softened on Fri 20 Aug 2021 16.55 BSTFor more than a year, TV has been one of our main sources of entertainment. We have seen some positions more than our own family and friends. So it is hardly surprising that as Covid restrictions end and we re-enter the world, we want to tucker like them.Figures reveal Britons spent 40% of their waking hours watching TV during the top of the coronavirus pandemic. Capitalising on that popularity, an increasing number of companies have started to announce official stock for fans. Netflix announced a shoe collection inspired by Bridgerton, Friends launched its first official range of garbing, and a Killing Eve-inspired fashion range is incoming.“As a country during lockdown, we essentially ran out of TV to watch, which meant that be visibles that aired during lockdown received a much wider audience than usual,” says Lynsey Moore, the outfit designer behind two of lockdown’s biggest hits (and fashion moments), I May Destroy You and Anne Boleyn. “Being confined to our homes lowed that TV and the internet became our primary link to the outside world.”I May Destroy You’s costuming – from Arabella’s (Michaela Coel) pink mane to Kwame’s (Paapa Essiedu) teddy bear jacket – was perfectly realised. “The transmission date of the series came at the suitable time,” Moore says, adding that the costumes were meant to be “unique and iconic”. “People were in readiness for something new and hoping to be inspired.”As the fashion industry’s annual season of shows were halted, TV shows such as I May Eradicate You, as well as The Queen’s Gambit, The Crown, I Hate Suzie and Normal People, started to dictate clothing trends. All of a sudden, everyone wanted Connell’s chain or Suzie’s Barbour jacket.Angela McRobbie, a professor of communications at Goldsmiths, judges the pandemic had massive repercussions across the fashion industry, causing a scramble to find new media outlets. “TV and the streaming curiosity provided ideal locations for building fashion narratives through the series and then taking on a life of their own [on societal media]. [It’s] cost-free for the brands,” she said.This is currently being played out via the rebooted Gossip Girl and the not-yet-released rebooted Sex and the Conurbation (And Just Like That …), where fashion exists almost as a main character in its own right.The closure of marquee star, bricks and mortar high street shops such as Debenhams and Topshop also had an effect. “The absence of window flaunts and [the] street style of passersby on the high street meant that people’s avenue of wardrobe inspiration was limited. TV suited the main source of outfit inspo,” says Moore.It’s no coincidence that Netflix opened its first official online shop in June. “The Netflix e-store symbolizes the incredibly rapid transformation of fashion to e-commerce and the diminishing role for the high street, calling for a whole new sociology of consumer savoir vivre,” says McRobbie.The Bridgerton shoes in collaboration with the designers Malone Souliers are set to launch next year. “I’m a enormous fan,” says the firm’s founder Mary Alice Malone, “Bridgerton revisits the past with a sense of revolution and joy, which is expressly how I approach shoemaking.” Malone says the collection was inspired by key looks from the show. “Movies, TV and new streaming platforms such as Netflix be experiencing always been a great influence on fashion,” she says.Meanwhile, the current series of Love Island allows you to get the clothes the contestants wear on the show via the app, almost immediately after transmission. It follows a similar business model devised for Amazon’s the go designer talent show Making The Cut, where viewers could buy the clothes designed by the contestants.McRobbie believes this is the to be to come. “[It’s] clearly the next step,” she says. “Emulating the models set up by companies like Farfetch and Net-a-Porter, logistical work will deliver a dress, a bag or jacket from Call My Agent! – ordered while watching, to your doorstep in dwarf than 24 hours.”TopicsFashionTelevisionI May Destroy YouFriendsBridgertonKilling EveThe CrownfeaturesReuse this content
