As the weather improves, we’ve all begun to put on our long-awaited summery wardrobe pieces. The Varsity fashion team hit the streets of Cambridge to see what people are wearing, look for style inspiration and discover what’s on people’s minds for upcoming summer fashion.
Tirza, law at Caius
Tirza picks a colour each day and coordinates her outfit according to that; she’s currently really into the 90s, as evidenced by her claw clip – a lovely Hawaiian vibe. She cites the whimsical Phoebe Buffay from Friends as a style inspiration, saying that, if she dresses anything like Phoebe, “that’s when I know it’s a good outfit”. She’s also inspired by Friends′ Rachel Green and rapper Lauryn Hill. This summer, she’s most excited to wear white maxi skirts and brightly coloured outfits.
“Cambridge has an authentic, underrated style that most people don’t know about”
Tirza loves buying clothes from Vinted and recommends favouriting items you like to tailor the algorithm to your tastes. A hot tip from Tirza is to search for key terms that are aligned with your style – she might look up words like “lace”, “fairycore” or “cottagecore”. With a woven belt, star hair clips, a tooth gem and an assortment of rings, she’s got accessorising down. She looks to junk jewellery bundles on eBay for a good deal.
Coming from London where people may be too attuned to trends, she feels that Cambridge has an authentic, underrated style that most people don’t know about. As a third year, she reflects on how Sidge fashion has evolved throughout her studies. However, ultimately, the vibe can best be distilled as “just cool clothes”.
Isobel (left), law at Newnham & Jack (right), studying at York St John
Isobel and Jack discuss how music inspires their fashion. Isobel explains that being a K-pop fan motivates her to be more “out there” with her outfits, describing how she normally gravitates towards more maximalist clothing like weird patterned dresses and tries to coordinate her earrings with her outfit. In her pocket is a pocket watch – on theme for Doctor Who, which she’s going to watch at the movies tonight. Jack enjoys looking like they listen to the music they like, such as twenty one pilots, and is wearing a band tee with sleeves they cut off themselves. They like to layer different items like fishnets with shorts and embrace DIY, cutting up T-shirts or tops to style them in the way that best fits them.
Annabel, medieval history at King’s
Annabel is a real advocate for dresses in the summer – she gravitates towards them because they’re the easiest to wear and choose and they can make a full outfit look put-together and elegant. She loves to accessorise her looks with sunglasses and headscarves. Wearing 60s-style button earrings and a stack of bracelets, she explains that her accessories and jewellery are a big part of her and she “feels naked without them”. Annabel also expresses that nails are really important to her; she tries to paint them to match her shoes or the rest of her outfit.
“Own it and go with what fits you personally”
Where she shops inspires her, from Mango to Barbour – the collections they release give her excellent outfit inspiration. Annabel prefers timeless country-esque pieces over a more urban vibe and discovered this by going with what suits her personality. The best style tip she has learned at uni is to own it and go with what fits you personally, even if that may be “old lady clothes”.
Izzy, history at Peterhouse
Izzy doesn’t exactly plan her outfits because her entire wardrobe is pink. She explains, “I just feel so much happier in pink” and that pink is absolutely her favourite colour. She transitioned to a full pink wardrobe over several years after noticing that half her wardrobe was pink and deciding henceforth only to buy pink clothes.
Like Tirza, she cites Vinted as her go-to and only buys secondhand items. Starting when she was 15, she hasn’t looked back, both for environmental reasons and because it’s so much cheaper. She loves to create mood boards on Pinterest before attempting to find similar pieces on Vinted, saying that the algorithm gets to know what she likes.
Rocco, sports and graphics student
Rocco also describes how the music he likes influences his style – he’s inspired by the rappers he listens to and their style, especially on social media. For example, he bought the Broken Planets hoodie after seeing rapper Digga D wear it in a music video.
Fashion inspiration is everywhere just waiting to be discovered; it’s in the music we listen to, the people we pass on the street and the shops we browse. We hope our little trek around town has given you some good fashion inspiration for this spring and summer.
