So Observer and Grazia have crowned American Apparel as label of the year and I *thought* I was going to scratch my head in disbelief at such an odd choice when I read everything and duly had to nod to the following...

"Turnover has increased from £7m in 2007 to £14m this year."

"American Apparel is unashamedly concerned with dressing the
urban-dwelling sixth former/early-twentysomething. To a degree, its
laid-back, sporty, pretend-vintage, flirty sexiness defines that
generation. It is sexy (tight, short, low-cut), it is clubby, it is casual; it is the antithesis of respectable office wear."

"American Apparel has also become synonymous with the New York 'hipster' movement. They dress exclusively in vintage, hats, designer one-offs produced by their hipster friends - and American Apparel....they're pretentious and over-attached to irony and they inspire vitriol in everybody. The hipster brand, and the American Apparel brand, are indistinguishable"

So whether you like it or not, AA has infiltrated our wardrobes either as a blessing or like a plague and the 'hipsters' (which Polly Vernon had to hilariously and painfully describe in laymans terms to the Sunday Observer crowd....) are behind AA all the way...

I've always been a bit ambivalent to that H word which inspires hatred, jealousy and a mean spirit from people, all of which I find a bit tiresome because my brain isn't big enough to start pouring insults on a word/a movement/a style/a group of people (however you want to define the word...) that I only have a vague idea about.  It's like me sitting on a fence whistling as said hipster walk by whilst someone else will mutter 'Damn hipsters!' and I'll be scratching my head thinking 'Ohhhh so THAT'S a hipster!'  Ignorance is bliss?

Still, if my vague perceptions are anything to go by, I can hazily deduce that there apparently exists something of a 'hipster' uniform that is supposedly transcends across a lot of Western Civisilisation cities; skinny jeans/AA leggings, AA tee, white/black plimsols (peeps in London get them from Cheshire Street) and kerazy sunnies of some sort...

Ain't nutin' wrong with that... but under my rose tinted glasses for 2009, I've somehow come up with a slightly jazzier version of the formula that IF it indeed became the next gen of hipster uniformity, I'd gladly be labelled one (with a sticky label if you want...)...

Skinny jeans/leggings >> Skinny satin trews... hopefully these will come in all kinds of shades and effects too.

AA tees >> Sheer t-shirts layered up in all kinds of kerazy colours (let's be honest, the crazy with a k has to remain... couldn't get the right pics to illustrate but ya know what I mean!)

Plimsolls >> Clarks desert boots...I'm not giving up on these and with the trews slightly rolled up and no visible socks worn, the 'off/odd' element is thus here.

Kerazy sunnies >> Elaborate headgear...again, a selfish ploy here but taking hats aside, if those AA satin headbands are so popular then surely some oversized adornment is the next step.

P.S. I'm currently feeling rather redundant in ACTUAL useful information or insight hence a silly post like this.  Still, I expect you guys to be LESS silly and put forth your own SERIOUS views on what you feel about AA getting this accolade, hipsterage and all that jazz which I know very little about...