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(REUTERS) - Menswear, the perennial poor relation of women's high fashion, is staking a larger claim on the lucrative fashion stage, as retailers tap a growing men's clothing market and runways in New York reflect American men's rising interest in high fashion.
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Never in the vanguard of U.S. fashion, menswear is striving to catch up, say fashion experts taking stock of the collections showing at New York's Fashion Week which runs through Thursday.
With the luxury menswear market growing at about 14 percent a year, or nearly double that of luxury womenswear, according to consultancy Bain & Co., the financial stakes are high.
"High fashion menswear used to be a bit of a joke, but it's becoming a genuine influence. It's beginning to duplicate women's wear," said David Wolfe, creative director of retail consultants Donegar Group.
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A demographic that was once "style conscious young men and very label conscious," is "now grown up, and bringing that same style sensitivity and label snobbery as adults," Wolfe said.
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Tom Julian, author and retail trends expert, noted growth in the expanding $50 billion-plus menswear arena for clothing such as jeans, knits and accessories.
Julian cited major retailers like Saks adding a denim room, and Ralph Lauren's new Rugby concept.
"There is more interest in tailoring touches for sportswear," he noted. Accordingly, "casual has shifted beyond what was -- khakis and button-downs. Unstructured or knit jackets, sweater jackets and the like allow for layering and individualizing."
The collections at New York's Fashion Week, when hundreds of designers show both men's and women's fall lines, bore that out.
And like the women's shows, some of which displayed hallmarks of popular 1920s-era films like "The Artist" and "Midnight in Paris," menswear took a page from the popular "Downton Abbey" British TV series, set on the eve of the 20s, with heavy use of cord, velvet and grosgrain trims and round-collar shirts.
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Wolfe characterized the looks as "much more well-behaved than 'rebel rocker,'" while Julian noted that "men have embraced color in unexpected ways -- a bright colored check shirt, the colored chinos, the colored shoes."
"Many men today like the idea of taking a tailored item like a blazer or a necktie and making it less formal to play into their look," Julian noted.
Tommy Hilfiger's ambitious show on Friday reflected trends seen throughout the week: quilted sleeves and vests, lots of narrow horizontal stripes, high-collared doubled breasted coats topping striped vertiginous turtlenecks.
