Begin with a fashion show
The Dsquared2 Fall/Winter 2023 show hit Milan Fashion Week, returning to a combined men’s and women’s runway format. It was the future meets the past, as a group of teenagers from Dsquared flaunted a string of characters from the Catens dormitory era: geek, goth, celebrity, emo, female.
They wear broken and reconstructed clothing, carefully reproducing material with a rebellious twist.
Opened by TikTok superstars Nic Kaufmann and Jean Carlo Jashlem. The Y2K-inspired silhouettes and Western design norms are set against a backdrop that showcases designers Dean and Dan Caten‘s preference for individualism.
As you can see, the backdrop of the runway was set to a campus dormitory. With skateboards, drums, and posters of all sorts, this is a student room full of rebellious colors and unique tastes. The dormitory is busy and even a bit cluttered, but it’s definitely a paradise for the maximalist!
Western fringed jackets, Canadian coats, crystal encrusted worn denim, denim leather straps, ultra-low camisole overalls, exposed boxer briefs, teddy bear aviator jackets, lace panties, and sheer halter tops are put through their fashion filters, spit out, and reassembled into beautiful body-exposing crazy ensembles.
“Play with women’s clothes, play with men’s clothes, and it doesn’t get any hotter than dudes in teenage panties and lace!”
Ideas from the fashion show
The basic theme of Dsquared2 Fall/Winter 2023 is Teenage madness. Romantic, wild, strong sense of youthful recklessness is really amazing.
Start from this fashion show, we can see the return of the y2k wave and get some y2k fashion male ideas!
Key colors
Key colors: water blue, ruby red, light pink
This series of light pink, bright ruby red as an accent color to attract people’s eyes, pink is certainly not exclusive to girls! Denim blue in the fall and winter denim series has become the key color of denim, olive green has become an important color of the retro nostalgic biker wasteland nostalgia style, and the overall style is about the art of mix and match.
Key item: Hot short tops
Inspired by Y2K and backed by western design codes, the show presented a personalized fall/winter collection that reflected designers Dean and Dan Caten’s preference for individualism.
The men’s short tops broke the stereotype of boring menswear and redefined the new look of menswear with color and shape.
Key item: Low-rise jeans
Denim pieces are essential in Dsquared2’s Fall/Winter 2023 collection. The patchwork jeans with a pentagram created by old dorm room items are the perfect pieces to create a collegiate outfit, and the straight, low-rise jeans are a y2k fashion male style key point. Pair the top with a jacket or T-shirt for a stylish mix of big tops and small bottoms.
Key Detail: Lace
As you may have noticed from the previous picture, the show utilized a lot of lace elements as embellishment points! This combined men’s and women’s show used tulle lace in comfortable and soft lingerie material for the edging design, the underwear ready-to-wear design, and the use of men’s ready-to-wear style, is to break the gender boundaries between men and women, blurring the gender design concept, and has become a new hot topic in this show.
Key detail: Fur Panel
The warm and comfortable fur material has become an important design fabric for this fall and winter show. Ultra-short section of the panel fur jacket with ultra-short low waist pants, is the perfect choice for y2k fashion male styling.
Thick fur coat and pink low-waisted jeans, mix and match, denim and lamb’s wool splicing to become this season’s details highlights of material splicing.
Key detail: Western fringe
Flowing fringe details are truly eye-catching, and the use of American shoulder pads on the shoulders becomes an innovative highlight. The traditional varsity jacket is also treated in a western style, and the denim jacket is also decorated with elastic fringes, creating a unique exotic western style.
Key detail: Scratched and damaged
Many of the clothes in this show are made from old dormitory items.
The unique vintage atmosphere of the old things, and the splicing and stitching of denim, creating a brand-new retro mix of college style wear look.
Denim wash marks and hanging silk wear undoubtedly aggravate the sense of retro atmosphere, western cowboy’s wide jeans were made into a one-piece wrap dress, wild and uninhibited.
Key Accessories: Sense of contrast
A sense of mix and match was a big part of Dsquared2’s style for this fall/winter show. This mix and match embodies the crazy, open-minded philosophy of Generation Z, which is also shown in the accessories.
Leather compact handbags, modern and stylish, were paired with wild and rugged fur coats for a bold and wild look that was both powerful and sexy.
And a large fur bag paired with a tight bright pink short top is the complete opposite of the above – but with the same emphasis on contrast.
Bringing out the beauty in chaos is the essence of the y2k aesthetic!
Conclusion
DSquared2 completed the evolution of its own retro genes and y2k fashion male style with a wide range of epitomized fashion items and irregularly styled ensembles; at the same time, it also cleverly echoed the theme of the show: youth is unstructured, against order, or should be so crazy.
If you don’t like the way I present myself, then the problem is with you, not me.
—— Dan / Dean Caten
With Dean and Dan Caten at the helm, the show was certainly an ode to the y2k fashion male style, taking inspiration from the teenage subculture and bringing a tongue-in-cheek design language to what has so far seemed a rather serious season.
Resources：
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https://www.vogue.com/
