The Evolution Of Fashion's Online Fandom

The evolution of fashion’s online fandoms have given rise to virtual communities devoted to designers and brands—where they show their‘Likes’one click at a time.

- Allysha Nila

While TV, music or film fan bases are much easier to identify (like Lady Gaga’s Little Monsters, Harry Potter’s Potterheads), fashion fandoms are far more elusive online. They can be centred on specific garments, styles, designers or brands, and manifest in enthusiastic, passionate or downright obsessive ways. Take the Tribe, for example, a group of loyal Rick Owens devotees who only wear his designs.

The trails to fan access are difficult to identify and collectivise because they exist ultimately as niches within a niche. Plus, the way the Internet is structured has made it tough to pinpoint when fashion subcultures truly began. There is a lack of proper historical documentation as to what communities were significantly active on which web platforms at a specific time online.

A CLICK AWAY

It all began with forums, which gave ordinary, non-industry users a taste of being a “fashion insider”, running as micro communities with moderators who had access to information and networks. One such forum was The Fashion Spot, founded in 2001. There, you could (and still can) find remarkable people relentlessly scanning decades-worth of their comprehensive archives of past magazine issues—particularly from the ’90s and the early noughts (with proper crediting, no less). When the second wave of supermodels such as Natasha Poly, Sasha Pivovarova, Magdalena Frackowiak and Snejana Onopka came crashing in, the forum also became home to postings dedicated solely to their friendships with other models or cliques, their diet, their walk, ad campaigns and baby pictures. You could also find complete statistics on models—and this was way before Models.com came into the picture and the rise of influence celebrity-models such as Bella and Gigi Hadid, and Kendall Jenner.