Back in the day when adlays were transitioning into a certified Australian subculture, I began to notice the phenomenon of the ‘lad dad’ – older men whose unwitting lack of fashion sense resulted in them resembling a train hood (the only difference is the Nike bumbag slung over the shoulder would often be traded in for a nice pastel sweater). It seemed, at the time, to indicate that the level of apparel-based apathy that can only be possessed by Nautica sporting middle aged men could hold the key to a true form of couture-based self-expression.

What if, I thought to myself, there was a way to dress so ordinarily that it became exceptional? Of course, normcore went ahead and screwed things up for me by coining and mastering the phenomenon first and I was left empty handed and underwhelmed.

One year and three months later, the trend has re-emerged in its most beauteous form: fashion dads! Existing mostly in the form of instagram user fashiondads_ and the hashtags #fashiondad and #fathersonfleek, the result is a lowest common denominator techwear if you replace all those high quality materials with tracksuit fabric. We picked out some of our favourite ‘fits from fashiondads_ and slipped them in our gallery above. Check them out and stay steezy, papi.

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