Decoding Copenhagen
It's been almost a month since the last CPHFW and the street style looks live in my head rent free.
I visited for the first time Copenhagen last year for the Fashion Week. The city itself was amazing you can feel that people add style at everything they do or not do. From the cafes to the souvenir shops everything seemed unique to my untrained to Scandinavian style eye. For me Scandinavian style is Toteme and Acne Studios and Rains, but how people dress in Copenhagen is what makes them so unique and made the Copenhagen Fashion Week such a big success with only increasing interest for the last 5 years. My shopping experience was also very unique while I was there.
Strategically Copenhagen Fashion Week is organized at the first part of August which makes it the perfect Copenhagen weather and also the perfect moment for street style outfits that can inspire your Fall style. August in Copenhagen might be sunny but still might need a little cardigan for that chilly ocean breeze. Also it’s the perfect time for CPHFW to shine and not get outshone by her big sisters, Paris, New York, Milan Fashion Weeks.
This year’s street style was particularly attractive to me and to some other friends we were discussing it with, Copenhagen street style is famous for the maximalist color palettes, but this year particularly I found this mix and match more mature than ever. That’s why I decided to decode Copenhagen Fashion Week street style and understand what makes it so successful and what are the lessons learned for Fall 2024. For this analysis I used the pictures of my favorite street style photographer Déspi Naka which you should follow if you don’t already.
Observations:
Blue, red & White: the old time classic, French flag inspired combination was definitely a protagonist in CPHFW’s street style. Navy blue was everywhere, red was popping in accessories most of the time and white was the neutral little sister that blends these two together on a transitioning outfit.
Transparencies & Lace: kind of expected but also very nicely executed the trend of the last 2 seasons was seen on the streets of Copenhagen on a sexy yet very girly fashion.
Scarf/Bandana: A lot of bandana instances were captured by the dear Despi Naka. What made them very special in this street style outfits is how they accentuated the mix & match of an outfit.
Head accessories: Hats, scarves, hair ties everything that can make a rather not boring outfit at all pop was worn by the fashion girlies. My personal favorites were the hats seen above and the hair moments of Vicky Montanari during the fashion week, that you can see at her posts below.
Some of the dominant colors from the street style photography of Despi Naka can be seen on the graph below. Interesting part is that the Green and the Pink hues were mainly Prada items and the brown Miu Miu.
How all the above blend to a very visually pleasant result? My take is this:
Cultural Fusion with different styles from across the world coming all together to make this beautiful colorful patchwork. We have the Southern Europe styles, strongly represented by influencers like Vicky Montanari and Caetana Botelho meeting with the Copenhagen fashion queens like Pernille Rosenkilde and at the same time the Scandinavian minimalism meeting the Antwerpen vibe. All at the same time at the same place. It’s not a lot of fashion weeks that you see this mix of designer pieces in one outfit blending so beautifully together.
Bold and Avant-Garde are also some of the qualities we saw during this last fashion week. When you see street style from Copenhagen it’s hard to classify it as classy, preppy, girly, sporty or whatever else, but you can definitely classify it as Copenhagen style. The bold colors, the mixed patterns, the unpredictable layering and the heavy but not overflowing accessorising is making it so unique and beautiful. Copenhagen allows the creativity in fashion to bloom.
That’s what makes Copenhagen Fashion Week unique.