In recent years, fashion has increasingly taken influence from the Scandinavian world of clothing. This influence has become even more prominent for Spring/Summer 2010, where a palette of pastel colours and functionality is at the forefront of this season’s trends. Scandinavian fashion has stayed timeless because of its characterized functional details that mix styles from past and present in an informal and playful way.

Standing as Europe’s fourth largest fashion city, Copenhagen has come into the limelight of the international fashion arena. It hosts its own annual fashion week during the months of February and August. Clothing has seized a keynote within Danish design, and within recent years a vast number of companies have managed to tap into the highly competitive, international field of clothing enterprise. To name but a few you find WoodWood, Won Hundred and Frost Birgens. These designers lust for affordable chic and all cultivate their own unique angle on design, innovation and functionality. Instead of the high streets littered with tawdry retailers imitating each other to see who can achieve the lowest prices, you get stores with rustic, earthy interiors and designers who excel in the art of clothing design that is suited to the frigid weather.

Because of its wealth and prosperity, Denmark is a country with great cultural surplus. Art is often supported by the government and this gives abundant opportunities for artists to develop and express their creativity. Observing the fashion-culture from the eyes of a British individual, you notice that everyone here seems to possess an innate style that is effortless and artful. Getting dressed in the morning, anticipating a day of bombing through blizzard-like conditions on a bicycle and still looking fresh enough for a beer with friends in the evening, is a tough task.

The UK is built on big corporations and British heritage retailers. Talented young designers are not given half the chance they should have. Is this because our government wants the economy to be based on huge retailers? Or are we all slaves to these big companies telling us what to do and what to buy through this technological, commercial advertising frenzy we live in? Where has the romance gone?

The entrepreneurial approach for most of these Scandinavian designers inspiration is primarily found within different movements of music, cinema and art and serves to define a foundation of modern crafted clothing that oozes sophistication, style and Nordic flair. They seem to have a tradition of liberalism and vast space for creativity. They seem very eager to safeguard this environment, which is reflected in their lifestyles and cannot be put in any other way rather than ‘sheer simplicity’. Maybe this country could learn something from this more simplistic way of life.

Words by Ben Tattersall

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