Did birds flock together and hire a powerful publicist to polish their image? Just a few years ago, they were branded as the beginning of an apocalypse with the outbreak of avian flu. But then, overnight it seems, they became the trendiest motif.
The winged migration began a few seasons ago as the home was turned into a veritable aviary with cute birds perched on a multitude of décor items. Cockatoo soap dish or owl print cushion, anyone?
Now it seems that fashion designers have gone bird-watching this season. For his lower priced line Marc by Marc Jacobs, the designer took an almost child-like approach with cartoonish prints of cute little birds all over dresses and rompers. Others, like U.K.-based Canadian designer Erdem Moralioglu went with a lady-like approach with a print of fluttering hummingbirds nestled amongst flora on dresses and trench coats.
And there were some designers who looked to the darker side of our feathered friends, like designer Giles Deacon who not only featured giant prints of swans on dresses but featured a blood red swan as a headpiece.
It appears it truly is a bird moment — even beyond fashion. The popular micro-blogging site Twitter features a bird as its mascot. And with the latest news this week about the discovery of a species of dinosaurs as big as a T-rex that had feathers, birds can now be viewed as some of the most ferocious creatures that walked the earth. They couldn’t have asked for a more powerful image makeover.