London-based fashion search engine Lyst, in case you’re unfamiliar, boasts more than 70 million users worldwide. As such, they tally more than 10 million unique searches each month—from the newest Prada bucket hat to Patagonia’s freshest fleece. The company leverages these insights — as well as social media searches, mentions and engagements, Google search data and sales — for quarterly reports they call the “Lyst Index.” In other words, the rankings of the most searched items, the most talked-about brands and trends they see sweeping out of focus and washing ashore.
The index’s 2021 Hottest Brands List proves dominated by luxury labels, sportswear legends and hyped-up houses: Gucci, Nike, Dior, Balenciaga, Moncler, Prada, Louis Vuitton, Bottega Veneta, Saint Laurent and Off-White round out the top 10. Each earned their respective ranking through high-budget digital marketing campaigns or upticks (in the case of Nike) in online sales.
However, the Hottest Products list tells a different story. While the “hottest” product at the beginning of 2021 was the YEEZY 450 Sneaker — which looks like a tote bag bred with a dumpling — four out of the other nine were Gorpcore garments and gear: Arc’teryx’s Beta AR Jacket, Patagonia’s Classic Retro-X Fleece Jacket, Salomon’s XT-Wings 2 Advanced Sneakers and Burton’s Edgecomb Jacket (popularized by Bernie Sanders at the last presidential inauguration). “Searches rose 96 percent for the Burton brand overall,” Lyst reports.
Other entries included Moncler’s Gui Vest, Prada’s Logo Bucket Hat, Nike’s University Blue Dunk Lows, a Brunello Cucinelli Button-Down Denim Shirt and a bright pink sneaker by Rick Owens. In years prior, we might’ve anticipated utter dominance by streetwear staples like Supreme or storied haute icons like Hermés. However, this upheaval points towards the pandemic trend of buying for functionality, a newfound (and renewed) adoration for the outdoors, the overlap of Gorpcore and designer goods and the accessibility of most outdoor apparel.
But the trend has outlasted the height of the pandemic, signaling, at least according to Lyst’s Q4 2021 summary, that GORP gear is a serious player in the style game — even in spite of people who really go outside knowing this for decades. Two of the top 10 products of the latter half of last year were outdoors-focused items. Patagonia’s fleece jacket and Salomon’s sporty sneaker might’ve slipped out of the top 10, but taking 7th and 9th place, respectively — behind items like Off-White sneakers and Prada bags — were the Arc’teryx Alpha SV Jacket and The North Face’s NSE III Tent Mules. The former is definitely still in stock, while the latter is a little harder to find. Thankfully, though, The North Face dropped a slightly cheaper version that’s nearly indistinguishable from the original. Shop them both below.
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Arc’teryxAlpha SV Jacket
Arc’teryx
