Fashion Terms — the Apparel Search fashion terminology directory
Normcore is a unisex fashion trend characterized by unpretentious, average-looking clothing — what a certain group would consider normal clothing. Its wearers do not wish to distinguish themselves from others simply by their clothing: they consciously choose undistinguished clothes such as t-shirts, hoodies, short-sleeved shirts, jeans and chino pants, worn by men and women alike. The word blends normal and hardcore, first appeared in the webcomic Templar, Arizona before 2009, and was taken up by the trend forecasting group K-Hole in 2013 as an attitude: finding liberation in being nothing special.
A mix between normal and hardcore, but leaning more toward the side of "normal".
Have you heard the term Normcore? Are you a fan of such a trend? Actually it was envisioned by its creators, not a fashion trend, but more as a broader sociological attitude.
Normcore is a unisex fashion trend characterized by unpretentious, average-looking clothing. What a certain group would consider “normal” clothing.
According to the New York Times, “Normcore (noun) 1. A fashion movement, c. 2014, in which scruffy young urbanites swear off the tired street-style clichés of the last decade — skinny jeans, wallet chains, flannel shirts — in favor of a less-ironic (but still pretty ironic) embrace of bland, suburban anti-fashion attire.” (http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/03/fashion/normcore-fashion-movement-or-massive-in-joke.html)
Normcore wearers are people who do not wish to distinguish themselves from others simply by their clothing. This is not to mean that they are unfashionable people who wear whatever comes to hand, but that they consciously choose clothes that are undistinguished (not overtly trendy). Although Normcore is somewhat an avoidance of trends, it has actually been a bit of a trend in its own right.
The "normcore" trend has been interpreted as a reaction to fashion oversaturation.
Normcore clothes include everyday items of casual wear such as t-shirts, hoodies, short-sleeved shirts, jeans and chino pants.
These clothes are worn by men and women alike, making normcore a unisex style.
"Normcore" is a portmanteau of the words "normal" and "hardcore". As far as we know, the word first appeared in webcomic Templar, Arizona before 2009 and was later employed by K-Hole, a trend forecasting group, in an October 2013 report called "Youth Mode: A Report on Freedom".
As used by K-Hole, "normcore" referred to an attitude, not a particular code of dress. It was intended to mean "finding liberation in being nothing special." However, a piece in New York magazine that began popularizing the term in February 2014 conflated it with "Acting Basic", another K-Hole concept which involved dressing neutrally to avoid standing out. It was this sense of "normcore" which gained popular usage.
The word was named runner-up for neologism of the year by the Oxford University Press in 2014.
Don't worry, you don't have to be normal.
Normcore arrived after a decade of street-style clichés — skinny jeans, wallet chains, flannel shirts — in which dressing distinctively had itself become a uniform. The New York Times described the movement, c. 2014, as scruffy young urbanites swearing off those clichés in favor of a less ironic, but still pretty ironic, embrace of bland, suburban anti-fashion attire. That built-in irony is the term's engine: opting out of fashion loudly enough became a fashion statement of its own, and normcore has been read ever since as both a genuine preference for comfort and anonymity and a knowing joke about trend culture.
In practice, a normcore wardrobe is built from the middle of the clothing rack: plain tees and hoodies, straight jeans, chinos, sneakers and unbranded basics in washed-out, neutral colors. Fit is relaxed rather than tailored or oversized, logos are absent or incidental, and nothing in the outfit asks for a photograph. That distinguishes normcore from minimalism, which pursues a reduced wardrobe as a design discipline, and from simply not caring about clothes — the normcore choice is deliberate, and its practitioners can usually explain exactly why they dress that way. As the coinage itself concedes: you do not actually have to be normal.
Both, depending on who is using the word. K-Hole's 2013 report used normcore for an attitude — liberation in being nothing special — not a dress code. A February 2014 New York magazine piece popularized the dress sense of the term: dressing neutrally to avoid standing out.
Everyday casual items: t-shirts, hoodies, short-sleeved shirts, jeans and chino pants in undistinguished styles and colors. The point is conscious ordinariness, not carelessness — normcore wearers choose bland clothing on purpose.
It is a portmanteau of normal and hardcore. It appeared in the webcomic Templar, Arizona before 2009, was employed by K-Hole in an October 2013 report, and was named runner-up for neologism of the year by Oxford University Press in 2014.
Normcore polished and groomed becomes the clean girl aesthetic — the same plain basics, finished with slicked hair, dewy make-up and gold hoops.