The Abercrombie & Fitch Documentary Reveals How Power Decides What’s Cool
‘White Hot’ documents how the fashion retailer used exclusivity, racism, and warped beauty standards to shape 90’s teen culture
Early in Allison Klayman’s new documentary White Hot: The Rise and Fall of Abercrombie & Fitch, former A&F model Bobby Blanksi explains that the retail store sold a dream, almost like a young person’s fantasy of fashion “by advertising them with no clothes on.” Klayman’s Netflix film tells a chronological story about Abercrombie & Fitch, a retail shopping mall store that shaped teen culture in the late 90s and early 00s through extremely exclusionary tactics. Unforeseen at the time, was the era of accountability that would emerge a decade later, changing not only the retail store’s structure, but culture itself.
As someone who lived through the peak of A&F culture in late high school and early college, the film resonated with me deeply. Though I grew up in a white, middle class town, I didn’t have the money to purchase A&F clothes, nor the body confidence necessary to enter the store. It was intimidating and daunting for someone with low self-esteem to even walk by the storefront in the mall. Abercrombie & Fitch stores stood out because of blaring music, exceptionally fit and shirtless…
