Casuals Culture

HISTORY OF CASUALS

THE EIGHTIES

By the early eighties the skinhead fashion had drifted away from football and a new breed of ‘football fashion’ had come about. The young men who worked Monday to Friday eight til five, who went to the football at the weekend as a get away from it all now had something else to spend their money on, this being expensive designer clothing. Not since the Mod era in the 60’s had lads been so bothered about their appearance. Favoured labels in the early days of the casuals were Lacoste, Tacchini, Ellesse, Kappa, Burberry, Lois, Levis, Pringle, etc. Station Platforms on Saturdays were packed with young wearing Fila BJ tracksuit tops (these were the official tracksuit top that tennis legend Bjon Borg used to wear) and lois cords or a burberry Harrington jacket with a burberry scarf underneath wrapped high around the neck and a pair of levis jeans. Most importantly of all was the choice of footwear, if you didn’t wear the correct trainers, you didn’t look the part. Adidas were the trainers to be seen models such as trimm trab, forest hills, grand prix, etc,

another popular trainer were diadora borg elite (like the fila tracksuit top these wear worn by Bjon Borg). The scousers were the front runners in fashion as they would pick up the latest styles from abroad on their European trips, they would regularly walk into Lacoste boutiques emptied handed, but come out with a handful of polo shirts and sweaters, obviously with no receipts for any. By the mid – late eighties the labels were changing with the expensive sportswear being replaced with designer labels such as armani, aquascutum, chipie, chevignon but burberry and lacoste were still very popular.

THE NINETIES

TODAYS CASUALS

The 21st century is upon us and casuals still exist up and down the country, with lads still splashing out hundreds of pounds of flash designer clothing. Somewhere between the year 2000 and 2001 Burberry seemed to explode and was seen on every street corner, the most popular item being the ‘house check’ baseball cap. These were re-launched in mass production, so the exclusivity was now gone and a lot of the casuals didn’t want to be seen in them, 14 year old school girls wear now walking round in what only 12 months ago was the coolest headwear on the terrace. The Burberry ‘house check’ shirt was and still is very popular amongst most casuals. Another label which became very big was Hackett, at the European Championships 2000, virtually every other England fan in Belgium was wearing a Hackett polo shirt, the most popular being the ones with the St. Georges cross on them, with this overkill the Hackett fad died out within a year or so. Favoured labels with todays casuals are Aquascutum, Armani, CP Company, Paul & Shark, Burberry and above all Stone Island, the expensive Italian designer sportswear with the famous button-on sleeve badge is still the top label amongst the finest casuals. Footwear has again changed, gone are the Rockport boots of the late nineties, replaced by Campers, Clarks Originals (wallabees etc.), Timberland Boots and a lot of Adidas ‘old skool’ trainers similar to the styles from the eighties. After the quieter spell of the nineties it would as though the ‘casuals’ fashion has become very popular, there are many lads at football grounds across the country dressed head to toe in designer clothing. Numerous of these are just very young naïve lads who just look the part and wouldn’t know what to do if it kicked off, but just like in the eighties they are using football matches as a catwalk, trying to out dress each other. But a lot of these lads are true casuals who not only ‘talk the talk’ but do in fact ‘walk the walk’ and are up for it week in week out. Not only are there the young casuals at todays grounds, but a lot of the what were young casuals of the eighties, now thirty/forty something professional men are there in their expensive designer clothing leading by example. Soccer casuals are not just a fad or a fashion they never were it’s a Culture. www.casualsculture.com.

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