How Fashion Got So Crazy: A Brief History of Dressing for ‘Likes’

In a word, yes. In the early 2000s, street-style blogs became a new way of looking at modern fashion and offered an alternative to the highly curated imagery of magazines and ad campaigns: candid shots of people walking (or running, or chatting or snacking). The photos featured eye-popping ensembles that merged the fantasy of high style with the reality of women rushing to work. Ms. Pantin compared the effect of being photographed on the street to “being the heroine in a movie, except it’s your real life,” she said. “The rush from being photographed was so flattering, so of course I started shopping at sales, trying to find designer pieces that would help me dress to be seen.”

Lots more people began pumping up their own style for both street-style photographers’ cameras and their own. Around the world, professional fashion editors and DIY bloggers alike posted daily streams of their increasingly wild outfits on blogs and social media, gaining thousands—sometimes millions—of fans in the process. Some street-style stars took photographs of themselves, like Filipino blogger Bryanboy (Bryan Grey Yambao) and London fashion writer Susanna Lau, whose blog was called Style Bubble. Many, like the Italian stylist (and former model) Giovanna Battaglia  Engelbert, were photographed as they attended fashion weeks around the globe, the shots plastered across the homepage of the widely read (but now defunct) fashion website Style.com.

Even teenagers in their bedrooms were becoming Internet style stars. Witness Jane Dashley (née Jane Aldridge), whose blog Sea of Shoes chronicled her outlet-shopping scores in Dallas, as if they were hunting trophies. “It was crazy how I could go online and have thousands of likes for a pair of Balenciaga shoes,” said Ms. Dashley, now 31. “Meanwhile, at school, I was kind of a freak.”

The new relevance of this alternative fashion royalty was established not by a Vogue spread or designer campaign, but by photographers like Mr. Schuman, Phil Oh and Tommy Ton. The trio was inspired by Japanese street-style magazines like Fruits and Popeye, along with earlier work from Bill Cunningham, whose famous “On The Street” spreads in the New York Times documented the candid, chaotic beauty of urban life. Armed with digital cameras and with an audience hungry for daily fashion content, the trio and their ilk began sharing their imagery on blogs and helped build a new pantheon of style superheroes for the online age. 

“In a way, it started with the models,” said Kirstin Sinclair, one of the few female photographers on the original street-style scene. “Agyness Deyn, Anja Rubik, Lily Cole. They’d take designer pieces and mix them with their everyday clothes from Topshop and Primark, and it looked so cool.” The early “classic” street-style shots featured a knowing mix of designer must-haves—a Balenciaga City bag, or a pair of high-heel Chloé Paddington boots—paired with everyday items like denim jackets or vintage concert t-shirts. But as street-style newbies like Danielle Bernstein and Julia Frakes began winning brand sponsorship deals and front-row access, and Instagram allowed them to gain followers and advertising dollars on a global scale, the competition for “likes” increased. “It became clear that getting photographed could really help your career,” explained Ms. Pantin. Also clear: Viral fashion was now driving actual fashion trends. By the mid-2010s, subdued peacoats were out. Full-on peacocking was in. 

What was once a steady drip-drip of maximalist style on the street soon flooded the runways, as Alessandro Michele, who took over as creative director at Gucci in 2014, crafted graphic looks with logos the color of traffic lights and embellishments visible from yards away. Jeremy Scott’s Moschino confections bridged a similar gap between kook and chic, with dresses shaped like chandeliers and handbags that functioned as eye candy by looking like actual candy. Meanwhile, runway-show statement pieces like tulle-piled skirts by London designer Molly Goddard and even Chanel’s novelty bags became coveted streetwear staples, and the line between performative fashion and everyday style (regardless of whether you were wearing Hermès or H&M) basically dissolved. 
At the same time, many fashion-magazine editors and well-connected bloggers and Instagram stars were signing their own covert deals to wear certain brands to shows, ensuring that fashion houses—not aspiring fashion obsessives—determined what clothes appeared in “candid” street-style shots. “We used to dictate the designer trends to the brands,” said Mr. Oh, who currently shoots for Vogue. “Now we document them for the brands. It can still be very cool,” he said. “Just not as often.”

MEET THE IMAGE-MAKERS

Three OG street-style photographers on their favorite early snaps

“I started taking street-style photographs in 2006. I was obsessed with this blog called Hel Looks, which was based in Helsinki. I was like, ‘If these crazy looks exist in Finland, what can I find in London, New York, Paris?’ I set up [the blog] Mr. Street Peeper because I figured it would be an excuse to travel, and when I uploaded photos, I’d tag the clothes. I thought maybe I could sell trend reports to retailers or brands. It wasn’t until 2008 when Puma asked to run ads on my site that I realized trend reports weren’t the business—the photos were the business. They offered me $30,000 for a campaign, and I thought they made a mistake. I was expecting a check for $3,000. I couldn’t believe it when I saw that extra zero. I thought, ‘Wow, okay, I guess I have a career.’” Find his photos on Vogue.com.

About the shot

“This is Michelle Elie, who’s a fashion editor in Germany. I saw her at a Louis Vuitton show in Paris in 2016 and she was in head-to-toe Comme des Garçons. She’s always so gregarious and fun! She loves the attention, and I don’t mean that in a negative way. If you love fashion, why not celebrate it and wear the stuff you love? She started running down the street to make it in time, and this driver slowed down just to watch her. My favorite moments are when the fashion world and real world intersect. We live in such a bubble, you know? Seeing the driver’s reaction to what’s going on—the shock, the befuddlement—it reflects 95% of the world’s reaction to fashion. But the rest of us? We’re like, ‘Oh, okay. Just another day in the office.’ And I think that’s amazing.”

Tommy Ton, New York City

Background

“When I set up my blog, Jack & Jill, in 2005. I was living vicariously through Japanese street-style magazines and my boss—the owner of a boutique in Toronto— let me go to Paris fashion week one season to trend-scout and take street-style photos. I waited outside the Tuileries and the Louvre, where a lot of the big shows were, and I saw these people—models like Freja Beha and Raquel Zimmermann, editors like Carine Roitfeld—who were superheroes to me. I knew I had to figure out how to do it for the rest of my life. I think I really got my groove when I stopped over-analyzing every photo, and asking every person what they were wearing. Instead, I thought, ‘Okay, I’m going to treat this as if I’m in nature photographing wildlife. I’m going to be super quiet and photograph what’s happening around me.’ That was 2008, and that’s when I got my first big ad campaign.” Find his photos on TommyTon.com.

About the shot

“This is a group of Teen Vogue editors, and I love it because it’s very symbolic of the direction of fashion around 2008. You can see they’re colorful, playful and accessorized. Coming out of the recession of 2008, and then seeing images of these editors dressing, I think it told the world that the new generation was more optimistic and excited about glamour. To me, this photo is great because it [reflects] that people were excited to get dressed up again.”

“When I was first sent to London fashion week, I never felt out of sorts being one of the only women, but I did get knocked around a bit because I am smaller and shorter than most [of the other photographers]. But then I found if I waited until everyone else had gotten their shot and I very politely asked people if I could photograph them, they’d almost always say yes and I’d get a more unique angle. When I was first working, editors [I worked for] would want shots of the front row. I realized the shift when suddenly all they’d want was street style. Soon after that, I got commissioned for my first book.” Find her photos on GettyImages.com.

About the shot

“This is Anna Dello Russo, who was then an editor at Vogue Japan. She’s got such a huge personality, and of course her clothes are outrageous and fabulous, but also, you can tell she’s having so much fun. She loves fashion and she wants to look like the star of her own movie, in a sense. She’s just fearless and joyful, and you can’t help but feel it when you shoot her. I thought the contrast of the colors and the black car was quite funny. We think of fashion as being so serious and severe, and here she is just smiling like she’s on holiday.”

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