Bandana: the story of an accessory that became popular again thanks to the pandemic

Everyone knows what a bandana is, but if you ask what this word means, it is unlikely that you will get a clear answer. It is originally from India and from the Hindi language "bandhana" is translated as "tie". Here, most often, this product is presented as a piece of cotton fabric with a traditional paisley print, but in fact bandanas are made of different fabrics, and there are simply no ornaments used for their design.

The history of the popularity of the bandana has more than one decade. These accessories can be seen both in films of the 50s and in music videos of the 80s. The popularity of the bandana is falling, then growing again, and today we are witnessing another round of fashion for this simple object.

The last surge in bandana fashion occurred in the 90s and the beginning of the "zero". It is difficult to name a music star who did not appear on stage or in the video with this scarf. It was not only tied on the head, like Christina Aguilera, but also used as a top, like Beyonce.

Bandanas stepped onto television from the stage and soon they decorated the heads of the heroes of youth TV series and TV shows for children and youth. In Russia, the accessory appeared a little later, but this did not become less popular. Not a single teen magazine has escaped the epidemic of placing perky girls and boys with bandanas on their heads, faces and necks on the covers.

Then the interest in fashionable headscarves somehow faded and they could only be seen on representatives of informal youth movements and rock musicians. But in 2019, the accessory returned, and quickly and immediately through the world of high fashion. Bandanas were present in the spring-summer-2019 collections of the model houses Alexander Wang, Max Mara and JW Anderson, and then migrated to the autumn-winter season of 2020. Moreover, the trend was also picked up by Jacquemus and Gucci.

Therefore, bandanas migrated to the face and people with mouths and noses covered with colorful cloth began to appear more and more often on the streets. I must say that not everyone agrees that the boom in bandanas is associated with COVID-19. As an argument, it is given that recently there has been a general turn in fashion to the 90s. Beaded bracelets, things with rhinestones, flip-flops with a jumper between the fingers, shoes with square noses — how can I not complement the image of a good old bandana?

This summer, you can buy a bandana in any mass market. The sale includes both models from well-known and expensive brands, such as Hermès and Alexander McQueen, and budget products, for example, bright and unusual scarves from the Russian company Miuff Kids. No one bothers to build an accessory from a piece of fabric you like yourself, in order to show off exclusivity and at the same time save on an acutely fashionable thing.

This year, bandanas are worn wherever possible — on the head, on the chin, on the neck, on the belt, in the form of a top or a bracelet on the wrist. There are many tutorials posted on social networks, where dozens of ways to use this piece of fabric are clearly shown.

Considering the options, it's hard not to notice that the fashion for the accessory has returned, but there is still a difference between the bandanas of the 90s and the 2020s. If earlier they had a bright or at least unusual and catchy pattern, now plain bandanas of quite calm colors are also in fashion.