Elevated Active: The New Athleisure

Observe:

What if you could stop everything for a minute.  Just stop.  Step outside of this moment we are in. 

If you are one of the lucky, your new reality is Working From Home, or as some call it, Living At Work.  You can close your eyes and just for a moment, step away from this. 

Ask yourself what you want from this moment, from the uncertain future. 

What about a RESET?  We won’t get a do-over in our shared version of Dystopia Now.  But what we CAN do is create our own sanctuary.  Whatever each of us have in our own homes, whatever we like to wear, we can create our own comfortable haven with little touches of luxury to make it all just that much better. 

Interpret: 

When we are talking “little touches of luxury” in the world of apparel, the solutions we are coming up with are stylish and comfy – two words that used to rarely be seen together.  Function is now table stakes for almost any purchase we make but we also expect fashion to be sitting at the table too.  Athleisure as a style trend has now morphed seamlessly into a form of dress that could more accurately be called Elevated Active.  The function of the garment may be based on high performance fabric from the ACTIVE world but the color, trims and overall silhouette is often ELEVATED, creating a style you could easily wear in a professional career setting. The fabrics are often very ELEVATED too, they are soft to the touch, like a hug in this currently isolating, distanced-for-safety world.

Activate:

The fashion calendar is rapidly changing.  With traditional fashion weeks around the world not able to happen as in days past, every designer and brand is deciding how to show their new lines.  However, no matter how they do it, we will still be seeing new ideas and new trends emerge from these top labels.  Brands like these tend to dream big dreams.  Just a few of the many directional brands that are fun to look at each season are Prada, FENTY, Nike x Matthew Williams, Z Zegna, 3.1 Phillip Lim, Kith, Fila, Off-White, Pryer Moss. While at first those dreams often look strange, within a very short time, we are all wearing styles that have elements, colors and shapes that echo these looks. 

Here are two grids to show us what some of the Fall / Winter 20/21 looks were that came down runways in February of this year. This is an overall look. Over the next few weeks we will take these images and break them down to look at the styles in more detail to figure out what’s going on. For now, it’s fun to take a look at the dreams and see what these designers are foretelling.  Check out our Editions page for more on the Fall/Winter Runway.

Elevated Active Women

Elevated Active Men