Let’s Talk About It: Luxury Fashion’s Obsession with Sagging – Essence

Sagging burst onto the style scene within the ’80s and ’90s, as hip-hop became an outlet for artists and listeners. Impressed youth naturally desired to emulate their idols, donning baggy clothes with pants that hung below the waist. In 2021, Balenciaga released $1,200 sweatpants with a boxer-waist detail to mimic sagging. That sparked outrage online after a TikTok video of the pants was posted in the shop.

“I think my initial observations [on the sagging trend] it was especially true of celebrity culture. White celebrities, even some models like Hailey Bieber; that whole group that the media promotes over and over again,” he said Julian Randallauthor and PhD candidate in black consumer studies, “I was forced to think more critically about it when Balenciaga was selling these saggy sweatpants. The whole discourse around it was the first time I was confronted with it in a way I had never been before,” he explained.

The brand is currently known for its often controversial designs which can be designed to impress a response or grab attention. Non-Black celebrities like pop star Justin Bieber, Billie Eilish and Troye Sivan often fall short on other fronts. They have adopted styles just like traditional African American fashion, with oversized, baggy T-shirts, jorts or jeans that hit well below the waist. Eilish’s approach to fashion will be seen as a part of “Gen Z” fashion, as this younger generation is driven by quite a lot of aesthetics. What’s fascinating about her style, nonetheless, is that her music doesn’t reflect anything near hip-hop, but quite the alternative. This raises questions on how Black or African American style is perceived. Often, white consumers play on cultural approval because they see blackness because the epitome of elegance, but reject it for a “cleaner” look when it now not serves them.

The sagging trend has taken on a brand new meaning, with the illusion of wearing multiple pairs of pants or matching underwear now considered fashionable. Despite the controversy surrounding Balenciaga, brands like Miu Miu, Hed Mayner, and All-In have also embraced the trend. However, it has raised some concerns. To explore the growing interest in sagging, we delved into its history and interviewed experts on this once-significant phenomenon turned microtrend.

According to historian and creator Tanisha C. Ford, the sagging trend seems to have began intangibly. Sagging has often been linked to homosexuality in prison, but Ford believes it’s a gray area. She told NPR, “I don’t think we can definitively say that sagging started in prison.” Another specification of the trend comes from creator and fashion curator on the Cleveland Museum of Art, Darnell-Jamal Lisbywhich suggests that it could have began in prison for other reasons. Loose uniforms and clothing got to prisoners without belts to stop suicide attempts. Loose uniforms without belts got to prisoners to stop suicide attempts, which some consider is a reference to the practices of slave catchers who did the identical thing to stop enslaved people from escaping. This prompted government officials to take motion.

What’s most annoying about seeing sagging as a broader trend beyond blackness is that it has historically only negatively affected black participants. In 2007, Ocala, Florida city council member Mary Sue Rich was so upset about sagging black youth that she led a law that required young men to wear their pants too low to face a $500 wonderful or as much as six months in jail, in accordance with NPR. The law was repealed in 2020 after 13 years in a predominantly Black or African American county. That’s no surprise, because the Black Lives Matter movement gained traction in 2020 with the goal of creating real changes to the standard of life and safety of Black people in America. Other states have enacted similar bans in Wildwood, New Jersey, and Pikeville, Tennessee. “I’ve never supported this, even as a resident,” said Deputy Mayor Chris Davis, who sponsored the repeal in Florida and “I thought it disproportionately affected a certain segment of our population, which is young African-American males.” Even President Barack Obama made a press release on MTV’s Sway in 2008, saying, “Brothers, pull up your pants.” But he said legislating against the trend was “a waste of time.”

The politics of sagging and the prospect of dressing like a thug or dressing dangerously have plagued the black community for a long time. But punishing young black men solely for his or her clothing has been much more dangerous. Black consumer analyst and author Julian Randall has spoken out in regards to the high fashion space that has deemed sagging problematic: “Historically, [brands have studied Black consumers] to some extent. For example, stylists for hip-hop artists couldn’t draw from European high-end fashion brands. They didn’t need to work with them due to these stereotypes of what rap and hip-hop is. Eventually, as young white men began embracing hip-hop styles, big brands began taking notice. They’re using elements of black culture to maintain it cool or culturally relevant. They know that hip-hop is essentially the most influential phenomenon on the planet.”

Lisby, a fashion curator on the Cleveland Museum of Art, explained that the push to appropriate saggy clothing has to do with the undeniable fact that black history has not yet been reconciled with that of other oppressed cultures, which is why perceived disrespect and cosplaying of black people is so quickly worn and unworn by their white counterparts.

“It comes down to how the world views black people and can we, as a global society, reconcile the history of black people around the world? And because we haven’t and we still haven’t. It all comes down to this idea of ​​policing blackness and constantly demeaning blackness and then moving through history without coming to terms with the past, which as a byproduct is disrespecting or disrespecting black culture.”