Dress to distress: fashion embraces the frayed, torn and deconstructed look
From her four-bed house share in Hackney, east London, second year Central Saint Martins textiles student Benét Matthias is working on a backlog of knitwear orders. She didn’t set out to create a business so early on in her studies, but demand is high and she’s working at capacity.
“Most of my sales are from TikTok. I’m shipping around the world to America, the Netherlands, Spain – everywhere, really,” she says. “Customers are a mix of teenagers and people in their 20s, and most are women.”
Unlike typical knitwear designers, Matthias uses deconstructed techniques. “It’s ladders and things that look like they’re falling apart. I create unfamiliar silhouettes and exaggerate the distressed look,” she explains. “It’s a slow craft.”
It’s no surprise Matthias’s work is booming. From Vogue’s January cover stars to Balenciaga runways and Tokyo street style, the deconstructed look is taking 2024 by storm. It consists of clothes that appear unfinished. Think frayed edges, ripped denim, exposed seams and torn knitwear. It is hailed as a movement against the minimalist Scandi-style trends that have dominated in recent years. Online platform Depop reports searches for deconstructed knits are up 75% month on month. Many of the hot new designers use recycled materials. The more damaged something looks, the more deconstructed it becomes.
In fashion, there will always be an undercurrent of DIY styling and design, but the creatives behind this movement are generating a huge following and buzz. “The appetite is there for a more authentic, thrown-together look,” says Hannah Almassi, editor of Who What Wear UK, a fashion, beauty and shopping website.
Designer Conner Ives – known for his work with pop star Rihanna – makes deconstructed T-shirt dresses using vintage materials. Menswear designer Jawara Alleyne is another London fashion week name to note, says Almassi. His punk-flecked pieces have been favoured by celebrities including Beyoncé in the past year. His DIY approach involves thrifting for high-quality, preloved garments and transforming them into decorative showpieces. Vogue’s latest issue also centres on sustainability and features designers, such as Torishéju Dumi, whose deconstructed blazers are made using offcuts of fabric salvaged from large wholesale warehouses.
Ives thinks this approach is one way to do something about the sustainability issues in the fashion industry. “I love the thrill of finding a vintage graphic T-shirt, and figuring out what we can do with it makes it even better. This ultimately means that each one is unique.”
Matthias says she is creating lasting items, and the more damaged or holey they get, the more deconstructed they look: “My knitwear is handmade, so it takes a lot of time. People are buying it to last.”
Deconstructed clothing is the opposite of quiet luxury – the neutral, understated dressing which established itself as the dominant aesthetic of 2023 – but experts say the two looks work alongside each other. “I’d say it’s less a movement against quiet luxury and more that the minimalist, super-clean look simply isn’t for everyone,” says Almassi.
Vintage dealer and designer Sami Miro is a good example of someone who combines this aesthetic with high fashion and luxury, she says, proving that this isn’t “an either/or style tribe”.
The data analyst and market researcher Molly Rooyakkers, who runs the Instagram account Style Analytics, agrees. “Multiple major trends can exist at once, and I see this deconstructed and distressed look as a rejection or rebellion against the more dominant minimalist, clean-girl, Scandi-style trends we are seeing.”
It may be different from quiet luxury, but the price tag can be the same. A Balenciaga denim jacket with a raw-edged hem that conjures a sense of chaos? £1,550. A deconstructed layered neoprene mini dress by Japanese label Sacai? £583 in the sale.
Unfinished hems and frayed edges are also styles we have seen before. They are part of the unpolished look championed by the Antwerp Six, the breakthrough group of 1980s designers that included Ann Demeulemeester and Dries van Noten, which had global influence. Their creativity was informed by social circumstances, including the surge of prosperity, social unrest, strikes, high unemployment, and the rise of HIV and Aids.
Designers today also say unravelling the clothes we wear is more than a trend – it is an emotional response to what is happening in society. “I’m hesitant to get on a soapbox and lament the issues we all face,” says Ives. “So this approach felt like a way to do something about it. It’s making a statement.”
For 20-year-old Matthias, it feels personal. “I have seen this kind of style framed as a trend recently, but I would describe my work as a reflection of myself. It’s very experimental, and I think it shows individuality.”
