Monday’s news that French Connection is to revive the eyebrow-raising FCUK logo of the 90s has been hailed as part of a wider fashion flashback to the decade of slip dresses and zip up tracksuit tops. But forget any talk of revivals for a moment and focus on what’s right in front of us: the f-word used as a marketing ploy, albeit with blushes saved by a strategic typo.
Slogan T-shirts are an obvious way to make a statement with your wardrobe – and those that swear are a particularly route-one form of fashion hieroglyphics. They offer the NSFW controversy loved by teenagers of every generation, guaranteed to get a satisfying eye-roll from parents. They signal that you’re definitely a rebel, but – in the case of FCUK – one with a 12A rating, thanks to the absence of actual swear words.
The 90s also gave us Fuct, a skate brand that even has a T-shirt emblazoned with a pile of cocaine and the slogan “cocaine cool” to really up the outrage.
The most recent incarnation of “fuck” in fashion comes from Commes Des Fuckdown, the streetwear interpretation of Comme Des Garçons. Seen on hats and hoodies, it’s worn by those keen to express their rebel hearts – AKA Madonna and Justin Bieber. The difference here is there’s no beating around the bush: there’s a “fuck” right there, plain for all to see (and disapprove of). The media happily obliged when Madonna wore one of the sweary beanies while performing in 2014.
But in 2016, slapping a jumbled-up version of the f-word on a top feels a little bit quaint. Of course, fashion has long experimented with slogans and imagery designed to shock. This has been writ large through sexual imagery on T-shirts – of which Vivienne Westwood’s Cowboys T-shirt, designed in 1975, is possibly the most infamous. Just two guys in profile, standing a whisker away from each other, dressed as cowboys and naked from the waist down. That image is still a jaw-dropper now. It makes the FCUK T-shirts look like child’s play.
