Remember the days when people would read up on the latest trends in magazines? Well those days haven’t completely gone, let print live on forever! But in this case, we’re talking about street style trends. Its been noted that fashion lovers have diverted from journalistic print to online blogs and social media platforms, for their fashion fix.

But what is it that makes it so popular? That’s probably due to the emerging fashion bloggers and their ‘ootd’ posts. We find it so fascinating that people from our level, aka the public are capable of starting trends just as designers and celebrities. Eventually once bloggers started posting regularly, it became popular and one could argue that ootd posts is street style. Once that started to kick off, other fashionistas, not just bloggers started posting their looks. They also include brands, almost a way of free advertising. One could argue that it’s due to the younger generation and their selfie-involved persona, their need to show off what they have and to gain many followers. Sophie Chapman, who previously worked for Harpers Bazaar, says the following “I think so many people take selfies nowadays, we basically street style ourselves. Journalists can just look on social media like Instagram to find people tagging certain designers or looks that they are going for.”

Afterwards inspiration from the street became an industrial trait, the emergence of Street style photographers proved street style was a popular trend. Designers and brands began investing into fashion bloggers. That eventually led to fashion weeks having more action on the outside than the inside. Bloggers and blaggers (People trying to talk their way into fashion shows) will stand outside the venue in their most eccentric outfits, hoping to get discovered by the pack of photographers. Once their pics hit mainstream media, that’s when the fame starts. Suzy Menkes said it best with her “circus of fashion” article, “Today, the people outside fashion shows are more like peacocks than crows. They pose and preen, in their multi-patterned dresses, spidery legs balanced on club-sandwich platform shoes, or in thigh-high boots under sculptured coats blooming with flat flowers.”

This is how street style became a phenomenon; it challenged the “trickle down” theory: that fashion starts from the designer and works its way down to the public. Now the public has just as much control as the industry, designers are now open to bloggers attending shows; they take inspiration from the public, Street style has returned to print magazines and for some (including us!) it’s the core USP of a fashion media product. The amazing variation of style and having a free (less pressurised) stylist of course will boost your love of fashion. It’s that fashion has become less overwhelming, that styling ones self has become less difficult. Once you get past the theoretical side of street style, looking at others for style influence is really great and with its popularity, its apparent it’s not going anywhere any time soon.