It was the moment that graced a million Instagram feeds last September: Jennifer Lopez’s fierce catwalk strut that closed the Versace Spring/Summer ’20 show. Gliding through an arch of outstretched show-goer arms, all capturing the moment on their phones, J.Lo’s jungle-print dress flew out behind her, a train of brilliant green rippling through the air.
That same dress quite literally broke the internet 20 years prior. Following Lopez’s first outing in it at the Grammy Awards in February 2000, Google – at the time, a much less dominating monolith on the internet landscape than now – saw an overwhelming surge in search requests for ‘J.Lo’s Grammy dress’, sending their development team scrambling for a way to appease demand. Ask, and you shall receive, dear internet users: Google Images was born shortly afterwards.
J.Lo’s walk for the SS20 show felt like a particularly poignant moment. For an industry that often prides itself on the ‘next big thing’, Versace and other designers used their Spring/Summer ‘20 collections as a way to pull on our heartstrings with a dose of ‘what used to be’. It all feels especially relevant now, with the indisputable need to take sustainability more seriously by reusing and re-wearing old clothes. “I think it just goes to show that fashion really is circular,” says Selfridges Lead Womenswear Stylist Molly Donovan. “Trends always come back around and have a renewed relevancy later on down the line."