Menswear Trend: Couture Sportswear

Colorful sportswear by Mai Gidah

In today’s hectic world, we often have so many needs, as our lives are becoming increasingly dynamic and energetic. We’re always doing very different things, going to different places and meeting with many people.

This is why, many people are always trying to grab onto many things at once when it comes to their clothes: they want comfort, but they want great style at the same time; they want something that goes well when eating out, but they also want something to wear for a quick run.

Also, many people, especially the younger generation don’t have the monetary resources to have many clothes and thus to compose many, extremely varied outfits that are suited for different contexts and occasions.

Moreover, many people today live in rather small places and don’t dispose of large storage spaces for their clothes and accessories. Therefore, need pieces they can easily mix and match and that strike the balances mentioned in the beginning.

This is why, during the last few years, easily starting around 2013, and growing since, many designers have created stylish, elegant and even dressy sportswear.

From the Y-3 spring 2014 collection

This trend has been a runway favorite for many fashion houses and brands. First, it was the conceptual brands that have taken on this aesthetic and soon many others followed. Soon enough, couture sportswear has become rather mainstream on the runways. Early adaptors have already worn this type of pieces in their everyday life since about 2015 or so, but now it seems that these clothes are going to be making it into the mainstream.

The “couture sportswear” aesthetic is defined by garments that are made from sporty materials, that can be easily manipulated and washed, that are comfortable and adapt to temperatures and other factors such as moisture that are modeled into clothes with couture-like designs.

Tracksuits are no longer just for the gym or the park, sporty jackets are no longer for working in the garden and work out shorts can be worn even to a middle range restaurant.

Couture sportswear is coming as a reaction to the fact that more and more people are wearing sweatpants and tracksuits as part of their daily outfits, claiming that they don’t have time to put together a look that is both elegant and comfortable, thus fulfilling that need. In the future, couture is going to make a strong comeback, so sportswear also needs to be upgraded, so that it is worthy to share the runways of the world with high-end clothing.

Jumper and trousers by Emporio Armani

Couture sportswear is definitely going to change the ways in which we communicate, the things we do – it will determine us to do things that seem to be more dynamic or, more likely going to give us the illusion that we are doing dynamic things – and the way in which society at large will be organized, as, we know, clothing is a strong shaper of society.

Of course, it will not be a change as big as going from corsets and huge gowns to pants and short hair for women or as big as changing the suit for a t-shirt and pair of shorts, but this trend will definitely make an impact on society.

We are expecting to see more of it on the runways and we’re expecting these type of outfits not be too heavily accessorized, if at all, in a first phase at least.

The mix between very high-end clothing and sportswear, may it be a merge in materials, design or any other element, is definitely going to be a big thing in the years to come. This does not mean that other types of fashion will disappear, but it definitely means that we will see a rise in this kind of clothing, both on the runways of the world and in stores.

Fraquoh and Franchomme