By Seham Ahmed
Through the years, everything has been repeating itself — events, stories, movies and even fashion trends. When you watch a movie filmed in the ’30s, you can notice some clothes that seem familiar with 2010s, or when you look at a magazine from the late ’80s, all you can see is how bright and crazy the colors are, rocking just like today’s fashion. The ’60s and its astonishing accessories and colors are close enough to the early 2000s.
These observations are not just predictions or coincidences; it is a fashion plan and people working in this field know a lot about it, as there is a fashionable theory that trends keep repeating every 20 years, 50 years and 100 years. There are different reasons behind this phenomenon. One of them is that designers usually get inspired by their parents’ or idols’ style, returning faded trends to life.
Denim, denim everywhere
In the Kuwaiti television show "Jadah 7”, a young girl called Ghasag has some arguments with her mother Nouriyah for wearing jeans the whole time. One of the scenes shows her going to a birthday party wearing jeans under her dress, as it was fashionable at that time and most Hollywood celebrities wore it that way. Another scene shows Nouriyah claiming her daughter’s name must be written in the Guinness Book of World Records for the number of jeans she owns. Denim in the beginning of the 2000s was a huge trend. Nowadays, the fad of wearing denim jackets, shirts, dresses, bags and pants is coming back.
Arabesque
Another trend which was popular in the early ’20s, bright wide low-waist belts, came back during the ’40s, ’60s, ’80s and early 2000s. Women wore dresses and with arabesque decorations and shimmery fabrics, with a low-waist fabric that looked like a belt and was mostly shiny and glittery.
This arabesque shimmery style was quite a trend during the early 2000s, and can be seen in the Kuwaiti TV show "Adeel Al Rouh”, where actresses wore glimmery and shiny styles full of accessorized fabrics. This trend was also seen in most local and international TV shows and movies at that time.
Colorful bold rocking ’80s
The recent Kuwaiti TV show "The Exchange” was set in the late ’80s in Kuwait. It starred two main female characters — Farida, played by Rawan Al-Mahdi, and Mounira, played by Mona Hussein — who were the first women to join the Kuwaiti stock exchange. Farida was a traditional, old-fashioned girl who did not keep up with the times, as most of her style went back to the ’70s, unlike Mounira, who adopted the new courageous trends, colors and hairstyle of that time.
White pearl accessories
Audrey Hepburn’s style in "Breakfast at Tiffany’s”, filmed at the end of the ’50s, Turkish actress Turkan Soray in the movie "Arim, Balim, Petegim” in the ’70s, Chanel and other fashion houses in the ’50s, ’70s and ’90s inspired a huge number of fashion shows with the famous black dress and white pearl accessories — necklaces, bracelets and earrings. The trend that began in the ’30s faded and came back many times. In 2013, Amal Al-Awadhi in "Ghosn Maksoor” wore this style in one of the scenes.
Carohat
The "carohat” plaid or checks trend was hugely popular in the ’90s. Jennifer Aniston in "Friends”, Alicia Silverstone in "Clueless” and Liv Tyler in "Empire Records” were fashion Icons. Carohat began in the ’30s as a classic look, always linked with suits, maxi dresses and skirts. It showed up again in the ’50s, adding more colors and shapes. In the ’70s, the look was casual, mostly as miniskirts, and with the ’90s, it looked more iconic, worn in winter with sweaters as a cozy comfy style or with casual wide jeans.
A different shape of plaids took off in the 2010s, when it returned, with rock and pop styles mixed with leather jackets, boots and skinny jeans. The classic look was still trendy, as Huda Hussein wore a carohat suit in her show "Al-Mohtala” in 2016.