Luxury Fashion is Back

Imagine this: You’re walking through the Gold Coast. You see your favorite high-end brand box store. You enter. Laid out before you are hand-crafted leather pieces with luxurious patterns. You pick one up and head to the register before being slapped in the face by the item’s obnoxious prices. 

The shock surrounding prices of luxury fashion is a reaction people have experienced for many years. Higher prices combined with the globalization of fashion trends has turned formerly accessible products into luxury goods. Despite this, people of all backgrounds have been buying into the idea of luxury. 

Although luxury fashion is becoming more popular for the everyday person, the idea of luxury still remains the same — having an item that makes a small group of people feel niche. This attitude has provided a love of luxury for several centuries. 

Access to these luxury items has pushed brands to adapt to the growing needs of the middle class. Luxury fashion has become nifty. They’ve emphasized the ability to be elegant and charming while keeping a reality check on prices. 

Generations and changing tastes may alter the characteristics of luxury fashion but one thing remains —  the interest. Fashion is becoming less about representing class status and more about making a statement. Clothes can not only represent the money, but also the ideologies a person espouses. 

Luxury fashion has incorporated these themes into today’s trends. The problems facing the world can now be fashionable. Luxury brands have adapted their statements and focus to impress multiple audiences while also remaining conscious of the issues presented to them by consumers.

Although luxury fashion brands have made strides in redefining their image and promoting sustainability, the high prices of luxury items continues to be a point of hot debate. Because of high demand, luxury fashion brands have steadily increased their prices — increases which have propelled them into public consciousness. Consumers will always be consumers. Buying expensive luxury items is akin to buying into a world of exclusivity.

Luxury is having an item, a dress, a piece of jewelry or some accessory no one else has. Whether it’s a flashy watch or a monochrome pair of boots, there’s privilege associated with luxury fashion. This is an appeal high-end brands know about and frequently use to their advantage.

Although many have called for an end to the trend of luxury, high-end brands continue to thrive. Despite the constant push-and-pull of luxury fashion, power still ultimately belongs to the customer. Luxury is whatever the customer decides is luxury. Vintage can be luxury, your phone can be luxury. The definition can bounce around to allow anyone the gratification of luxury in whatever way suits them.

The look, feel and appeal of other kinds of fashion — including vintage and minimalist styles — have become popular, in part, thanks to luxury fashion. When consumers diminish the impact of luxury fashion, they fail to recognize  luxury fashion has had a tremendous impact on other artistic outlets. 

Luxury, whether consumers try to dismiss it or not, is an ingrained part of culture. The beautiful purpose of fashion is that the actual luxury brands can change and consumers can change the definition of luxury along with them.