{"id":258129,"date":"2026-01-29T19:41:08","date_gmt":"2026-01-29T19:41:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/258129\/"},"modified":"2026-01-29T19:41:08","modified_gmt":"2026-01-29T19:41:08","slug":"brand-beckham-and-the-rise-of-the-clapback-costume-fashion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/258129\/","title":{"rendered":"Brand Beckham and the rise of the clapback costume | Fashion"},"content":{"rendered":"

It\u2019s been over a week since Beckxit and still we wait. Yes, we\u2019ve had David\u2019s aphorisms at Davos<\/a>; Romeo on the Willy Chavarria catwalk<\/a>; Cruz on tour<\/a>; Victoria\u2019s reunion<\/a> \u2013 not to mention the various fulsome Instagram posts from both parties. But no rebuttal, no apologies, no tears. Then, the remaining Beckhams hit Paris fashion week and finally we got our first statement.<\/p>\n

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David Beckham \u2013 once the most famous footballer in the world, now its most famous parent \u2013 was in town to wingman Victoria Beckham<\/a> as she became a knight of the Order of Arts and Letters. But he was also there for the optics. The remaining kids flew in. So did their partners. Some wore Victoria Beckham, others wore Loewe, everyone looked demure and sober and matchy-matchy, what a celebrity astrologist might call \u201ca united front\u201d.<\/p>\n

But it was David, walking into La R\u00e9serve Paris on Monday \u2013 a hotel so fancy it has more suites than rooms \u2013 that finally shifted the discourse. He was carrying a ludicrously capacious tan canvas Herm\u00e8s Haut \u00e0 Courroie bag (rarer than a Birkin if you can fathom that) and wearing a Momotaro jacket made from indigo-dyed sashiko dobby fabric. Forget the five-figure handbag \u2013 sashiko is a form of decorative reinforcement, or \u201cvisible mending\u201d, from Japan. It also translates as \u201clittle stabs\u201d. Oh, Brooklyn, what have you done?<\/p>\n

Even for someone as gifted at manipulating the media landscape as King Beckham, this reading is, admittedly, a bit of a reach. Was he sending a vestiary message to his estranged son or was he wearing something comfy on the Eurostar? Is David aware of sashiko \u2013 has he even read Sophocles\u2019 play Oedipus Rex? Are the family tabloid fodder or arch-manipulators of it?<\/p>\n

\u201c[The jacket] could be deliberate\u201d, says Andy Milligan, brand consultant and author of Brand It Like Beckham. \u201cHe\u2019s surrounded by the right people. And for all brands, how you appear \u2013 your costume, your demeanour, the way you comport yourself \u2013 is critically important. Whether the semiotics are overt or covert.\u201d<\/p>\n

David Beckham is not some courtier trapped by the rigid social mores of the palace \u2013 a silenced beauty there to be gazed at. But he also kind of is. He is part of a brand for whom intense scrutiny has never been incidental and who understand that, in this age of AI, social media and fungible truths, image is everything. Put simply, is this David\u2019s clapback costume?<\/p>\n

Making a statement \u2026 Chiara Ferragni at the Schiaparelli show in a leather power suit. Photograph: Abdul Saboor\/Reuters<\/p>\n

The clapback costume is Lily Allen dressing up as the French schoolgirl Madeline in reference to her song of the same name, which she wrote after discovering the identity of one of her ex-husband\u2019s lovers. It\u2019s Bella Hadid wearing an outrageous string bikini the same day as breaking up with her boyfriend. It\u2019s influencer Chiara Ferragni, freshly acquitted this month after facing fraud charges linked to her 2022 charity collaboration for selling branded pandoro, attending a Schiaparelli show wearing a girlboss leather suit.<\/p>\n

It is, of course, Diana, Princess of Wales<\/a>, whose famous shirred black dress, worn to a gala in 1994 shortly after her husband confessed his affair to the BBC, coined the term \u201crevenge dress\u201d. \u201cImages have always had more power than words, long before social media,\u201d says Jacki Vause, CEO of Dimoso PR and co-presenter of the podcast The Rest Is PR. \u201cAnd what is more powerful for a family we associate with fashion than what they wear? In crisis management, we always tell people to pay more attention to how they are than what they say,\u201d she says. \u201c[In this situation], the written word is very low down the list.\u201d With Beckham and the like, it\u2019s less about getting revenge and more about saying something, anything. Because where words fail, clothes do not.<\/p>\n

Revenge dressing \u2026 Diana at London\u2019s Serpentine Gallery in her famous frock. Photograph: Princess Diana Archive\/Getty<\/p>\n

For context: it\u2019s been a week since Brooklyn Beckham<\/a>, heir apparently not of the Beckham family, wrote on social media about his upbringing. \u201cI have been silent for years and have made every attempt to keep these matters private,\u201d he began. \u201cI do not want to reconcile with my family. I\u2019m not being controlled, I\u2019m standing up for myself for the first time in my life.\u201d He went on to describe how his mother danced \u201cvery inappropriately on me in front of everyone\u201d at his 2022 wedding to Nicola Peltz, and trademarked his name in 2016, restricting his ability to strike deals. The rest of the family was collateral, but seems to have picked their side. It\u2019s hard to pity a nepo baby brand \u2013 but harder to side with the people who struck the initial deal.<\/p>\n

This is particularly true in a landscape in which crisis management is a 360-operation, says Vause, adding that the Beckhams \u201cwarmed to the idea of using digital media for branding purposes earlier than most\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cFashion has been used to shape the conversation around David since he was a footballer,\u201d agrees Milligan, pointing to the hair, the sarongs, the leather jackets. \u201cIt\u2019s all about keeping the brand in the conversation.\u201d<\/p>\n

Modern and pointed \u2026 Wallis Simpson dressing with intent. Photograph: Granger\/Rex\/Shutterstock<\/p>\n

Royals \u2013 Diana, Meghan, the late Queen, in her post Brexit not-EU-flag hat<\/a> \u2013 are a prime example. Vause points towards Wallis Simpson, the American divorc\u00e9e whose relationship with Edward VIII led to his abdication, as inspiration: \u201c[She] always cocked a snoot at the royals by dressing in a particularly modern and classy way, without saying a word.\u201d The fame-fashion relationship is an open secret, and this forensic approach to character management often comes down to what these people \u2013 ostensibly brands \u2013 wear. As a family who built their business on fame, \u201cthis naturally involves having fans who look at you\u201d.<\/p>\n

We live in a visual age, and without pictures, there is no story \u2013 before words are read, judgments are made. Clothes have not replaced the written word, but they are, like it or not, a valid communication tool for anyone in the public eye, as important as they are immediate to parse. This is particularly true for a family like the Beckhams.<\/p>\n

While David Beckham likes fashion, he is not necessarily fashionable. (The man wears flat-caps and tweeds.) But he is a public figure, and like many public figures, he occasionally wears his heart on his sleeve. Underestimate that at your peril.<\/p>\n

To read the complete version of this newsletter \u2013 complete with this week\u2019s trending topics in The Measure \u2013 subscribe to receive Fashion Statement<\/a> in your inbox every Thursday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"It\u2019s been over a week since Beckxit and still we wait. Yes, we\u2019ve had David\u2019s aphorisms at Davos;…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":258130,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[430,156,111,139,69],"class_list":{"0":"post-258129","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-celebrities","8":"tag-celebrities","9":"tag-entertainment","10":"tag-new-zealand","11":"tag-newzealand","12":"tag-nz"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/258129","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=258129"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/258129\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/258130"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=258129"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=258129"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=258129"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}