Streetwear is a trend that can’t be captured in one phrase, stemming from a mindset of embracing the world’s contrarians and acting as a counteragent to wider fashion trends.

It opened a market to those who traditionally were not ‘allowed’ or expected to show an interest in fashion, showcasing subcultures such as skating, surfing and hip hop. The most popular streetwear brands such as Supreme and Palace emerged from the skating subculture which initially had negative public attitudes, specifically skaters who were marginalised for being ‘risky’, ‘devious’ and ‘unsavoury’ (Johnston, 2006).

Streetwear has borrowed from the ‘do-it-yourself’ aesthetic of punk, new wave and heavy metal cultures, allowing the individual to construct their own unique style, practise and identity. This DIY approach is evident even in their direct-to-consumer model.

Their values were centred around creativity, risk, freedom and, above all else, authenticity.

This is a postmodern mindset. Postmodernism can be defined as the stance ‘of doubtfulness, trusting nothing at face value, always looking behind the surface, of upsetting conventional wisdom’ (Cook, 1994, 317). In short, craving authenticity. The consumers of streetwear also crave individuality, another trait associated with postmodernists. Streetwear satisfies their interest in the diversity of human experience and multiple perspectives in a way that mainstream fashion culture never could.

Street style has been able to establish itself dominantly into one of the most influential trends in fashion, with 76% of 763 fashion and retail experts predicting that streetwear will continue to grow significantly over the next five years (PWC, 2019).

All this success has brought with it a dilemma. With fast fashion and luxury fashion brands replicating what has made streetwear so popular, it has lost its role as being the antidote to wider fashion trends, and has now become one of the most popular fashion trends. This emphasis and purity of celebrating individualism soon became appropriated by the corporations that initially rejected the concept of streetwear and its influences.

How can a subculture whose identity is rooted in outsiderdom survive absorption into the mainstream?