This town is too big to cater to just one trend, and this year everyone is going country.
From blockbuster movies and chart-topping hits to the popularity of western wear and cowboy chic, pop culture is saturated with the sights, songs and style of the American West, fittingly during a particularly patriotic year for the US, with a successful Olympic Games and an upcoming election.
“When you’ve been around for almost 160 years, you see trends come and go, but I feel like that’s not the case right now,” Tyler Thoreson, vice president of marketing for Stetson, the iconic hat company founded in 1865, told The Post. “The current embrace of Western style has a deeper meaning than just being a fashion fad.”
According to the latest data from Pinterest, searches for “country glam” have soared 8,700% since last year and searches for “western style outfits” are up 418%, while a new report from The RealReal finds that interest in vintage Levi’s denim and fringe leather has increased by nearly 70%.
Beyoncé’s album Cowboy Carter, released in March, included songs like “Texas Hold ‘Em” and a cover of Dolly Parton’s “Jolene,” and the trend has continued since, with Lana Del Rey’s Quavo-featuring “Tuff” and Post Malone’s country album, F-1 Trillion, debuting at No. 1 on Spotify’s chart last week.
And pop star Sabrina Carpenter’s sixth studio album, Short and Sweet, features some twang-y numbers, including the single “Slim Pickins,” while Shaboozie’s “A Bar Song (Tipsy)” topped the Billboard Hot 100 chart for several weeks.
“You still see it with the winners and the performers, but the music industry is going country. We’re going country. It’s happening,” Del Rey said at a pre-Grammy Awards event earlier this year.
But this pendulum swing isn’t just limited to radio hits: Coupled with the release of Twisters, a film about a tornado set in Oklahoma, it’s created a perfect country-western storm that’s sweeping across nearly every aspect of modern life.
In fact, this aptly named “Year of Yee-Haw” has even extended to fashion, with pieces that can be worn from the ranch to the runway.
Even on the streets of New York City, far from the rodeo, bootcut jeans, western shoes and big buckle belts can be seen, from Hollywood hunk Glen Powell creasing his jeans in true cowboy style, to Nick Viall’s “country chic” wedding, to trendsetters like Kim Kardashian and Bella Hadid flaunting cowgirl couture.
Pharrell Williams’ Louis Vuitton men’s fall 2024 collection combines equestrian materials like fringe, leather, and cow print with other desert motifs like wide-brimmed hats, bolo ties, cactus and paisley emblems, and turquoise gemstones.
Meanwhile, Schiaparelli took a space cowboy approach to its collection this season, fusing futuristic designs with traditional Western shapes and patterns, while Isabel Marant showed a fall collection that was full of fringe and suede.
But the so-called trend is the rural American lifestyle, and the versatility of the cowboy core has made pieces like denim a fashion mainstay: In fact, it’s “pretty rare” to find clothing that can be worn on the ranch or on the red carpet, Wrangler senior marketing director John Meagher told The Post.
“Maybe some people are drawn to fashion, or maybe they’re interested in music and the mix of country music and mainstream music and crossover artists,” Isha Nicole, Boot Barn’s creative director and vice president of marketing, told The Post. “Maybe that’s a way to get into this world.”
And this trend is not just exaggerated.
“I don’t think this is something that’s just going to pass and we move on,” Nicole added. “This is deeply rooted in what it means to be an American.”
So why, 70 years after the heyday of country-western movies featuring gunfights between saloon-goers and fictional outlaws, is the spirit of the American West suddenly back in vogue?
“I think there’s a certain power in saying this is an American genre, an American style, an American story, and it doesn’t belong to any particular group,” Ryan Hall, an associate professor of Native American studies and history at Colgate University, told The Washington Post.
In fact, Nicole said, Western style is associated with “something much bigger” than boots and cowboy-cut denim, and embodies ideal American traits such as kindness, generosity, loyalty, honesty and pride in country.
Meagher said these values resonate with anyone “whether they’re 18 to 21 and they live in Brooklyn, Echo Park or they run a ranch in Texas or Wyoming.”
A post-pandemic longing for the great outdoors, combined with a nostalgia for a sense of normalcy in a time of economic hardship, rapid advances in AI, and a divided nation, is having people turn to the traditional style of the American West.
“For me, wearing a western hat, denim shirt and cowboy boots is an expression of individuality and also an affiliation to the traditions and values of generations past,” Thoreson says. “It’s a powerful combination.”
