It’s been nearly five years since Doja Cat said, “Bitch I’m a cow,” in her viral hit Mooo!, released in 2018. Cow print, stetsons, fringes, spurs and boots fit for the Wild West have been all the rage since then. Yet, despite a lengthy stay in the style landscape, we’ve got new proof that the look isn’t going away any time soon.
The evidence? Sienna Miller’s viral Glastonbury outfit. It featured a double denim two-piece, snakeskin belt and white cowboy boots, effortlessly serving toned-down cowgirl realness like it’s never going to go out of style.
Miller’s Glasto ‘fit has been widely accepted as the best “street style” look at the festival, which is surprising considering the mash-up is nothing new.
Any major concert or festival attendees in the last two years can attest to the sea of pink stetsons, fringed jackets and disco-ball cowboy boots that have dominated the gig landscape, especially in the case of Harry Styles and Beyoncé’s latest tours.
The presence of space cowboys at Beyoncé’s Renaissance World Tour makes sense — the singer’s latest album, which she is touring at the moment, features her astride a disco horse on the album cover. Other promotional materials depict her wearing a metallic silver stetson and fringed chaps. That it’s also become a defining element of Styles’ tour, however, appears to simply be a spillover from its mainstream popularity into dressed-up concert-goer style.
Even before the Renaissance tour, there were cowgirls aplenty — Margot Robbie being papped wearing a matching pink Wild West co-ord on the set of the Barbie movie only fuelled it.
The trend really came to a head in 2022, when Kendall Jenner dressed as Jessie from Toy Story for Halloween, and cowgirls started popping up at every festival you could think of. The omniscient Depop became aware its popularity, with a 15 per cent surge in users searching for ‘Western’ items on the app last year.
So why does Miller’s Glastonbury look still feel so fresh in 2023? Probably because it feels so natural. Miller has been a stalwart of Glastonbury style since the early 2000s, treating internet scrawlers to her boho festival get-ups every year as she wades effortlessly through the muddy landscape. Boho and cowboy go hand in hand, which means Miller is doing Western style as it’s traditionally done: denim, subtle animal print and cool colouring.
Because that’s the other element: cowgirl style has become so extra and extraterrestrial, the wilder the cowboy, the less Western it feels. Miller is bringing us back down to earth with her styling, and reminding festival-goers and street-style stalkers everywhere that Wild West dressing will always be in fashion — as long as you abide by the basics.
As such, next festival season may bring with it less futuristic space cowboys and more crochet and cowboy boots, or double denim and floral dresses. As celebrities at Coachella taught us earlier this year — dressing too crazy is cheugy now, and minimalism is back in. So tone down your yee-haws and put that whip back in the closet: all you need is a staple summer dress and a pair of vintage cowboy boots to nail the look.
