Recent graduate from the Australian Institute of Creative Design, Peter is sharing his Passion for Fashion on annasusanne.com!  He is also a free-spirited traveller who loves spending his holidays around exotic destinations and enjoys travelling with his friends around the globe.  Here’s his two cents on why Millennials are so obsessed with fashion.  Follow Peter on Twitter and Facebook!

Guest Post by Peter Minkoff for Anna Susanne * The Travelling Pixie

Fashion? To Millennials – it’s a beautiful distraction.

The world’s favorite entrepreneurial hooligans, the Millennials, are the generation overstepping boundaries, pushing them forwards and backwards as they please; and we tolerate their caprice because, in all truth, they are the most powerful generation of brilliant individuals we’ve had the pleasure and privilege to be around.

 

Fashion and coping

Growing up in a time when survival (i.e. the time of recession and post 9/11 hysteria) was the most fashionable asset of all, Millennials had developed a new approach to all the ongoing things – more fluid aesthetics and personal style that wouldn’t compromise under pressure. And not only that it didn’t compromise under pressure but the voice itself got so powerful that it recycled some of the most dominant trends and brought back pieces we’ve never thought would see the light of day again – ‘60s, ‘70s and – most specifically – the ‘90s.

Swamped and overbooked at their workplaces, stretched between their office and social lives, Millennials adopted a specific nonchalant chic fashion that would give them comfort and yet – let them be (vaguely) fashionable. What they’ve known growing up was the ‘90s chic (if this era could even fall under the ‘chic’ category), so they’ve leaned on this particular nostalgia for inspiration. As opposed to the current momentum when all they can think of is how to pay back the student loans, the ‘90s were their time of possibilities, happiness and future. Breathing life into ‘90s fashion all over again came as a natural reaction to their lifestyle, a filtering through in search for calm and closure.

In addition, as a generation that was first to see the abolition of subcultures and specific tribes, Millennials understood this is the time to experiment and go with the unimaginable – from bringing back grunge to combining lace and gym wear; they’ve given us a whole new world of possibilities that tolerates everything – both in fashion and life.

And it’s not just the ‘90s; they too have turned to what they’re living – the technology and minimalism (the simpler, the easier) – drawing inspiration from gadgets and naked office walls. The first time in history we’ve seen the rise of technology haute couture (apparently, we’re all exciting to be walking electricity) and have embraced nude shades with an enthusiasm that could easily go by as ecstasy. Are nudes really that exciting? No, they’re not. But Millennials have presented them as such and we believe them.

 

It has to do with entrepreneurship, too

It is a well-known fact that Millennials are turning virtually anything they see into a business venture – from turning dump places into hip and trending coffee shops and advertising them as vital places to hang out at (all while drinking your beer straight out of a jar and witnessing the whole world would celebrate this nonsense as the ultimate hipster chic) to turning blogging into careers, Millennials have found the opportunity in fashion, too.

Fashion beyond fashion, that’s what they’ve done.

The fashion industry is a powerful business in itself, but what Millennials did was manipulate it for their own needs. Unlike fashion moguls who have already built a name for themselves by designing or showcasing, Millennials have used that fashion and explained it to “commoners” through a series of YouTube tutorials and blogs. To them, fashion moved beyond a powerful individual expression and turned into the opportunity to not only express their creative minds but earn a buck or two from it, too.

They’d take what’s popular, put it together into a delightful outfit, pose and voila – it’s a business, a movement, a strive. You go, Millennials!

Millennials fashion influence got so intense that everyone, even those who have never shown an interest in fashion, have hopped on the fashion wagon and started paying attention – to what they’ll wear, what accessories they’ll buy and what qualifies as Millennial-approved chic. Things got so hype that girls have transformed finding evening dresses in Australia (the mania is global, yes) into missions resembling quests for the Holy Grail while men – they’ve adopted a (and very intense) interest in fashion, probably like no generation ever has.

We have no idea what spell have Millennials put on us, but we applaud it. They’ve done more than any generation prior ever has and we have a feeling that things aren’t over yet.