It’s party time in London. Electro is the hot music; the drug crazy nightlife is over-the-top; and clothes are a mishmash of toxic colors and wacky prints wrapped in a do-as-I-please attitude. The result? Re-packaged ’80s New Wave that’s a slow boiling trend in Paris and New York but exploding across London. Electrowave is on full display at Portobello Road where Shibuyaku appliques and bunched up chains cascade from t-shirts and piece-together skirts. Accessorized frou-frou dresses are everywhere on platinum hair colored girls. Shoe designer Olivia Morris sells brightly colored pumps with deadpan prints at the new hot strip further up Portobello Road — the clothing designer
and jeweler, SO Aei:kei (357 Portebello Rd.) is next door. It’s in East London though, that the new generation of talent is channeling ’80s fashion and spinning DIY. Brick Lane and Shoreditch teem with new and vintage stores: Tatty Devine for Chicks on Speed panties and plastic jewelry; Public Beware (Unit 7-91 Brick Lane) for color block Japanese-looking flats. Rockit, Beyond Retro, and The Laden Showroom to meet all your dress up needs for Nag Nag Nag at Ghetto (Falconberg Crt.), the hot Wednesday party. Primitif (1 Chesire St.) pedals more selective Electro styles, selling cool Nike throwbacks and Charles Jourdan aviator glasses. And head to Lik Neon (106 Sclater St.), for industrial sounds grating in the background while you shop for neon everything.

Photo: Olivia Morris shoes