Soviet Chic

Oh, those glory days of the Soviet Union!

What better way to celebrate that warm and fuzzy time than through fashion?

MOSCOW, Nov. 26 -- Empowered by an oil boom that pushed the country’s trade surplus past $94 billion this year, Russia has been flexing its muscles abroad. At home, meanwhile, young and trendy Muscovites are in the throes of nostalgia for the staples of Soviet childhoods, relics of a time when the U.S.S.R. was at the height of superpower status.

That may explain why one of the most popular fashion designers this fall is Denis Simachev, who is selling overcoats fastened with hammer-and-sickle buttons, gold jewelry minted to look like Soviet kopecks and shirts festooned with the Soviet coat of arms, complete with embroidered ears of wheat.

“People in their 30s see these kinds of symbols as reminders of happy memories, like going to pioneer camp where they lived together, ate breakfast together and played sports,” said Mr. Simachev, 33, who wears his hair in a Samurai-style ponytail. He insists he is no Communist — for one thing, his overcoats sell for about $2,100 and his T-shirts for about $600. His boutique is sandwiched between Hermès and Burberry stores on a pedestrian lane, Stoleshnikov, that is one of the capital’s most expensive shopping streets.

Happy memories?

He has to be kidding.

Did Simachev ever suffer the indignity of standing in line for a day to get basics like toilet paper?

Mr. Simachev first attracted notice with a collection of retro Olympic tracksuits emblazoned with C.C.C.P., the Cyrillic initials for the U.S.S.R., and T-shirts printed with the likeness of President Vladimir V. Putin, which served as a wink at the cult of personality forming around the leader.

Remember when U.S. figure skater Johnny Weir caused a stir when he sported a CCCP warmup jacket at the Torino Olympics?

Not cool.

By tapping into a generation that is experiencing an identity crisis, Mr. Simachev, who is also known here as a D. J., a Ducati motorcycle rider and a snowboarder, has quickly become the epitome of Russian cool for a subset of gilded Moscow youth. They throng the pub underneath his store for lunch and on weekend evenings when it transforms into a nightclub.

Victoria Tirovskaya, 24, says she wears the designer’s clothes because they are chic and a bit audacious. “I have a classic blouse and shorts from Simachev but I also have a U.S.S.R. sweatshirt,” Ms. Tirovskaya, an interior designer, said. “Before Simachev, nobody dared to use the symbol of our country as a fashion icon.”

Is it liberating to flaunt symbols of oppression?

That doesn't seem to be the point though.

There seems to be a genuine desire to relive the glory days of the USSR.

...“At first, the people of my generation wanted to try those things that our parents could not, but now that we have seen everywhere, we are coming back to our roots,” said Evelina Khromtchenko, the editor in chief of the Russian edition of L’Officiel, a French fashion magazine.

Mr. Simachev has developed a swaggering fashion lexicon typified in his men’s wear by fur hats, fur boots, jackets with muscular shoulders and slim-hipped, low-slung trousers. “We are from Russia, from the former Soviet Union,” he said. “It’s what I know about, it’s what inspires me, and now, after years of Russians trying to live a Western lifestyle and forget they are Russian, other people are getting it.”

Russians are wearing Soviet Chic as a way to come back to their roots?

Yeah, those roots of oppression were really great.

Those desirable roots weren't strong enough to keep some of the greatest artists and performers of the Soviet Union planted there. They preferred to uproot and defect to the West.

...Russians more steeped in Soviet history say they are appalled at the merchandising of the symbols of totalitarianism. “Personally, I would never wear something by Denis Simachev because, for me, those symbols mean Stalinist terror, Communism, a K.G.B. spy system and the cold war,” said Alexandre Vassiliev, a fashion historian who has published 14 books here. “I disapprove completely.”

This is a perfect example of why it's important to know one's history.

"Stalinist terror, Communism, a K.G.B. spy system and the cold war" should be buried, not resurrected.

The designer’s fans say his motives are purely commercial. “Why did Andy Warhol paint Mao Zedong or Lenin? Because they are easily recognizable symbols,” said Nicolas Iljine, who specializes in Russian-American cultural exchange for the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation. “This is all pop nostalgia in a light-handed way. It doesn’t have deeper meaning.”

It may not be meant to make a political statement, but it's unavoidable. It does have a deeper meaning, like it or not.

The designer and the "trendy" Moscow youth are just too clueless to understand.

Wearing the symbols of the Soviet Union isn't all that different from a Jewish person wearing a yellow Star of David sewn on a coat for the "pop nostalgia" fun of it.

It's wrong to look back fondly on a time that was marked by the heavy hand of totalitarianism.