Look of the Week: Emily Blunt, fashion and the fresh food aisle
By Leah Dolan, CNN
(CNN) — Turnips, radishes, potatoes… This is not the beginning of Emily Blunt’s shopping list, but rather the items that appeared all over her latest red carpet outfit. Attending the Paris movie premiere of “The Fall Guy,” in which she stars, Blunt looked the picture of health — literally — in a Loewe Fall-Winter 2024 shirt and ballooning trousers smattered with root vegetables.
And while radishes rarely get a turn on the red carpet, fashion has been committed to making sure we get our greens lately. In 2022, Danish brand Ganni launched a “pop-up grow market” to celebrate their naturally dyed denim collaboration with Levi’s; where shoppers could peruse fresh beetroot alongside a mineral-dyed maxi dress of the same hue. For Spring-Summer 2020, New York based label Collina Strada not only printed tomatoes on trousers but replicated an entire farmer’s market stall for their NYFW runway — featuring donated produce attendees were encouraged to take home post-catwalk. And at Loewe, creative director Jonathon Anderson didn’t stop at Blunt’s potato-splattered two-piece. The collection, which debuted in March, also featured a hand-beaded purse shaped like a bunch of asparagus.
Is it another quick-to-wither micro-trend, perhaps “greengrocer girl autumn,” as the Guardian’s fashion editor Jess Cartner-Morley wrote last October? Or is the recent uptick in artichoke-printed apparel part of a longstanding fashion tradition? And should we, as one food academic claims on TikTok, view these turnips more like tea leaves — spelling out a message on the future of climate change and global food security?
As prices increase around the world, food — particularly fresh and out of season fruit and vegetables — is becoming a luxury for many. According to a 2022 report from food bank network Feeding America, one in six people in the US turned to food banks in 2021. Much like pineapples in the 17th century, certain produce is beginning to embody aspiration. Where once influencers filmed clothing hauls, now many also record themselves unpacking their food shop — sometimes racking up millions of views on TikTok. One academic studying food insecurity at Northwestern University has taken to the app, drawing parallels between the crisis and fashion’s penchant for food-themed outfits. “Luxury fashion houses are including more and more food/ grocery adjacent items this season because food is a luxury category,” wrote master’s student @kfesteryga.
And while we may be seeing more food-themed fashion on runways and in retail stores, the reality is edible patterns are far from new. In fact, Hubert de Givenchy was one of the first designers to marrythe culinary with couture in 1953 when he designed a dress embroidered with sliced tomatoes on “salt white” fabric. Forty years later, Cynthia Rowley printed a cornfield onto a mini-dress, while in 2004 Phoebe Philo went bananas for her Spring-Summer collection at Céline — covering dresses and leotards in the fruit. Dolce & Gabbana, too, has long looked to the fresh section for inspiration. At Milan Fashion Week in 2011, the Italian house presented bustiers, maxi skirts and tailored jackets covered in eggplants, onions and peppers.
JW Anderson — who is no stranger to serving up a selection of food in his clothing, from crocheted radishes to bunches of grapes and lemons — is more interested in making people laugh than making them hungry. “I like this idea of humor in clothing,” he told Vogue in 2021. “Squashes on jeans. A peach in the middle of a sweater. Something that makes you grin.”
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