I think there’s a trickle down effect from designers.
But designers also ultimately get inspired by consumers themselves.
There seems to be a growing interest in what “normal people” are doing.
In the past, designers have gotten inspired by traveling and seeing what the youth in the streets were wearing. Scandinavia, Japan, etc. With the internet boom, blogs are crafting their own kind of trend-setting culture.
Blogs like The Satorialist give readers a glimpse of the international street.
People aren’t just riffing off of Jane down the street anymore.
Even sites traditionally used for straight up commerce like Ebay are cultivating their own culture of image. Everything’s already been done. People looking for the new are sifting through the old…ready to put their own personal twist to it.
Between the two (what people* are wearing and what people are buying),
you can generally predict what you will see on the runway next season.
* The word trendsetter is so retarded. But basically people who are rabid design consumers.
And based off of what you see on the runway this season,
you can generally predict what you will see in the stores in a year or so.
(But a much more watered down, marketable version.)
I’d say the same goes for interior design as well.
Before you couldn’t really get a glimpse at what “normal people” were doing.
But now interior design and home blogs are popping up everywhere.
But I’d also have to agree with Peedub.
There does seem to be some collective independent consensus.
The phenomenon is rather peculiar.