At a pop culture-pilled rave in Tottenham, partygoers dress in post-ironic slogans, tourist trash truckers, and Cyberdog boots
One of fashion’s longest-standing trends is misnaming brand-sponsored activations as “raves”. Season after season, fashion publicists will host fashion week afterparties in TimeOut venues where editor-influencers talk a bit while LSDXOXO, Richie Hawtin, or OnlyFire perform in the background. Fashion loves to align itself with the underground, but sometimes a club is just a club. “They always feel so serious, too,” the organisers of London’s fashion-pilled OPIA rave say over DM. “You can be camp and queer and playful while still being editorial. That’s what we’re all about. OPIA was born out of the desire to showcase this queer subculture as one of the most innovative and non-conformist in the world.”
Mascotted by two blonde-wigged, brainless broads – AKA Bambi Dyboski and Bautista Botto-Barilli – OPIA was established earlier this year as “the Hard Rock Café” of the Tottenham rave scene. The whole thing is knowingly stupid, like when the duo rode the District line and informed disinterested passengers that Julia Fox would be attending its inaugural event in June, which was a lie. “It’s intentionally low-brow, which in a way makes it high-brow,” they explain. “It’s tongue-in-cheek and performative. Each OPIA has its own dress code and host brand, but it’s always Warholian in its obsession with pop culture… in a post-human, post-digital, post-Kardashian kind of way. It’s meta-ironic, we’re performing culture.”
The first OPIA event – Eurotrash 3000 – was billed as “the ultimate futuristic girls’ trip to Mallorca, celebrating all things kitschy, slutty, and Avicii-inspired.” And so a load of LGBTQs went to a disused garage in a north London industrial estate and listened to sped-up versions of “All Fired Up” until 6AM. “We heard what the girls wanted: the memes, the bimboisms, the green light to dress as eccentrically as possible.” Attendees dressed in Harajuku yeti boots, rhinestoned tourist trash caps, and Anna Bollina dresses with the words “drama”, “fame”, “greed”, “waste”, and “money” printed across their fronts in proto-meme fonts. “This sense of playfulness can be really empowering, sometimes the most radical and political thing a queer can do is to be happy and find laughter.”
The next rave, which takes place on July 22, pledges allegiance to Black, Latinx, and Asian emos. It’s like “Berghain meets Brazil,” as the invite reads. “Full body black latex with Demonias to the beach. Reggaeton meets Rick Owens. If Miss Colombia moved to Hackney Wick, dyed her hair black, married a DJ/tattoo artist, and is in the depths of a k*t addiction.” As for the future of OPIA, “we want our queers to take over the mainstream fashion world, to become household names, and we will do that by releasing our own line of magnets, paper plates, and trash bags if we have to,” the hosts write. “We want to keep showcasing how OPIA ravers, bimbos, and dolls are high fashion. We also want to be the It-girl afterparty for September’s fashion week. And to do the interviews at the next Met Gala.”
Click through the gallery above to see some of the best looks from London’s dumbest-but-smartest rave.