Who Needs Friends When You've Got Fall Trends?
I apologize to all my friends for that stray. I DEFINITELY need you, especially to tell me I look good in a rashguard.
Hi! This one’s long and kind of convoluted, so I’ll keep this short: Here is the F/W edition of my biannually silly trend predictions. As I explained back in January:
I base my dart-throwing off a few factors:
What the people I follow on social media who always seem to be inexplicably ahead of the curve are wearing
The obvious trends as per the most recent fashion shows/SSENSE front-pagers
What would be the weirdest, funniest, most underdog trend (these are usually the most robust, see: Keens; gas station-style sunglasses; clear, wire-rim aviator glasses)
What I want to manifest into omnipresence!
I like sharing these predictions with you, my valued enablers, because you may not have considered some of them as having trend potential, you might be into one of them whether or not it ends up trending, or you may be one of those metal-colon heroes powerful enough to manifest a trend into existence, thereby further enabling me. Maybe you’ll also think they’re kind of funny. If you end up wearing any of them, please oh please let me know at hr@humanrepeller.com or on Instagram.
Today, we are going in on everything from rashguards to volcel beanies to REAL HUMAN HAIR, and hopefully, you’ll glean something wacky to add to your fall wishlist (or DIY-list, if you have that kind of energy in this economy!).
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Thank you SO MUCH for your support, whatever you are able and willing to do to help is extremely valuable to me and I’m honored to be a small part of your life on the web.
Note: I might earn a commission if you purchase items using some of the links below, which costs you nothing and might actually save you a few bucks in some cases, so thanks if you do, and please let me know what you copped!
Acting Rash
I’m not a huge fan of Balenciaga, even in its vintage iterations, but Nicolas Ghesquière’s 2003 scuba-style designs are definitely compelling, especially the iterations that take structural and material cues from the lowly, oft-mocked rashguard, such as this dress:
Ghesquière’s Balenciaga is having a moment right now, from obsessive collectors like Eden Pritikin getting profiled by the insightful
(ok, three years ago, but in pandemic-warped fashion time, that still feels current to me) to this summer’s SSENSE-reified “mermaidcore” theme, with designers like JW Anderson and whoever’s ghostdesigning for Skims reinvigorating the sporty, slightly nerdy take on aqueous garments the rashguard exemplifies. I was a big rashguard-wearer as a youth, partially due to my family’s extremely white proclivity towards skin cancer, but mostly because the below images of Angelina Jolie in Hackers were seared into my brain at an unfortunately impressionable age:
As I wrote in my first EVER HR post, three years ago:
She wore an iridescent teal rashguard by Quiksilver, logo emblazoned across her chest, with a pair of skintight black pants belted at her waist. I first saw an image of this look when I was 14 or 15 years old and, though it was the dead of winter, pulled out my collection of emphatically modest swimwear. I wore rashguards to high school, sometimes finishing off my look with Keens water shoes (the trendier designs hadn’t come out yet, so I was out there wearing hiking socks with the most dad-oriented sandals of all time). Jolie looked jaw-droppingly hot and I looked like a little twerp.
I now have the hope and vision of redemption for my rash aspirations in the form of fall-weather fits. When contextualized with a leather jacket (colorful moto-style, like the above, is probably the way to go), shearling, or suede (even a puffer?), I think the subversion of expectations for seasonal implementation of swimwear is really dynamic. The design details that have been evoked in pieces, some included below, that aren’t actually swimwear but have a distinctly scuba feel, like visible contrast seams in harness shoulder placements and mock necks, as well as the actual specs of a rashguard — their wind-breaking, quick-dry tech — makes them just as legible in cold-weather settings as on the beach, and poses as an interesting alternative to other, more played-out sporty aesthetics, like F1 and horseback riding. It also looks kind of hardcore to wear swim gear in the F/W season, like those crazies who go surfing in Rockaway in January and are more mentally balanced than I could be even if I were to shut down this blog and go live in a monastery where my only sartorial options were sackcloth A or, on wash days, sackcloth B.
High High Waisted Trousahs
Though it’s been funny watching everyone react to the resurgence of “low”-waisted pants, in the mitigated capacity they’ve returned in the 2020s, from initial horror to ironic adaptation to earnest, visceral rejection of high waists, we all know that what goes down must come up, and I think we’re gonna go UP up, like, marching band uniform, cummerbund-style waists, all-but-bustier extended bottoms. I like it all, so I’m not perturbed either way, but I think Loewe did a great job at integrating the super-high waist into a “menswear” look:
The accompanying drop-crotch and the insanely long torso look the two effects coagulate into is interesting. You know how I feel about fashion that borders on body horror, so again, I’m into it, though it seems deathly uncomfortable in the crotch to leave that much room for chafing…
Shpikes
We are well overdue for some Ai Yazawa-level glampunk excess in fashion, and I think the porcupine effect (preferably in silver) is a great move for the fall, when skin contact starts feeling less like a requisite part of human interaction and more like a health and safety threat. Thin, pin-like quills and chunky, conical shpikes are equally cool when deployed correctly (without shame or hesitation, with a roundhouse kick if necessary).
Major Keys
This one is random, but I called it out in a bonus post back in May, then recently saw it on a TikTok stylist I usually don’t love, but I appreciated the look:
As I said in the bonus post:
This would be even better as a DIY with all the keys you’ve never given back to old flames’ places. Useful in case of urgent breaking-and-entering needs, too. You’ll never raise suspicion, there are just too many keys to find the one that fits your ex’s lock…
Crayolacore
Brooke Callahan’s new collection got it so right:
This fall will be full of mixed-n-matched, solid-colored, heavily pigmented garments that look staight outta the crayon carton.
Beanie.jpg
I hate beanies, usually, ESPECIALLY when I am bald, as I am now, but this might be the spoonful of sugar that makes the medicine go down:
Thin enough material to avoid the mushroomy look even sans hair, interesting enough to look like more than just an admission of defeat to the gods of the wind…This brand does it best, and if this beanie ever comes back in stock, someone will have to break all my fingers to keep me from ordering it.
Shants are Shalls
Last fall, I randomly put shorts over pants and thought maybe I did something:
Then I thought maybe not, but THEN, I saw Karoline’s brilliant iteration (cropped at their request):
I think there’s infinite potential for Shorts Over Pants (Shants?), playing with lenth and tightness to create different fit-and-flare patterns. Super tight, high waisted shorts over flared leggings? Adam Sandler-huge bball shorts over patterned capris? A great way to not let your shorts rot in closet hell for half the year.
Ride’em Boots
I fell in love with the below Nike riding boots, designed for the 2008 Olympic equestrians:
The simultaneous matrix-y, techy charm, quaint shape, and utility made me giddy.
Then I started looking at harness-laden moto boots:
And then, take a deep breath, I found these:
Tragically, brass knuckles and knife not included in the above.
FiDi (Fall Tie-Dye)
Much like the rashguard concept, bringing tie-dye into fall interests me, either by using warm, autumnal colors, fabrics like waffle knits/thermals, or by pairing, as with the Xuly Bët SS98 models below, with leather.
Hair Tactics
I already predicted hairy jewelry at the dawn of the year, but recently, I have been shown by the internet just HOW HAIRY things are gonna get really soon, from knit braids to literal human hair used as hair accessory. My favorite is still the Marland Backus necklace below, which, with some pain tolerance and pearls, you could easily DIY…I wrote more in-depth about using human body parts for fashion in May.
That was a lot! Nap time for all!
<3 HR
I love Eden <3