All The Trends You Need To Know This FW'19

Peeling back the frothy layers of the season’s gigantic frocks, and crowdsourcing the method to an impression that lasts longer than a garment’s rotation

- Andrea Sim

As we scrolled through FW’19’s atelier-fresh ready-to-wear back when they were first presented in the cities of their designers’ choosing, tulle, volume, frothy layers, and more tulle, occupied our screens. It transported the mind away from the far-flung locations they were unveiled in, with our thoughts promptly disembarking somewhere closer to home.

The sheer girth of Molly Goddard, mounds of Pierpaolo Piccioli’s Moncler, and titanic dresses by Tomo Koizumi all occupy a mind-boggling amount of space, and bore resemblance to a common occurrence on the public commute — one where a dude spreads his thighs well beyond the boundaries of his seat. In simple post-internet phraseology: the season’s ready-to-wear was manspreading. All over New York, Milan and Paris.

Is it really surprising considering that in recent years, females are seen to have a louder voice, more representation on the world stage, and are generally more successful than ever. Forbes reports the world’s highest paid celebrities to be Taylor Swift, Kylie Jenner and Kanye West — in that order. Separately, it also details a narrowing wage gap between genders, and that 49 per cent of working women in America are the main breadwinners.

The #MeToo movement, while not exclusive to women, has helped destigmatise speaking out about sexual harassment. One writer’s attempt to place a finger on the zeitgeist is that given fashion, like art, imitates life, female empowerment might just be the secret ingredient to the season’s bumper crop of dresses.