Ethnic Influences in Apparel Design

It's no secret that cultures influence each other in different ways on a daily basis. So ethnic influences in fashion are no surprise. Most are so common that they don't even stand out anymore. American influences on other cultures is called westernization, an example would be how many countries that now wear t-shirts instead of only their original way of traditional dress like many African countries.

In the past few years there have been a few major ethnic trends in Western dress. Asian influences were big a year or so ago with the silk Asian dresses and shirts with wide sleeves that sometimes wrapped around and tied. Scarves have been really big as well, especially the now trendy keffiyeh that everyone wears wrapped around their necks, which are an influence from the middle east.

Europe is always influencing fashion in America. Especially in places like New York, people tend to follow trends in places like London. People in America that dress Euro are usually considered much more fashionfoward, especially compared to Americans sticking to your basic t-shirt and jeans.

I talked about Anna Sui's Native American looking trends in her line from this years New York Fashion show in my previous blog as well.