High fashion is mostly outlandish and completely impractical, because it is about concepts and abstract ideas more than about wearability. High-end fashion (not high fashion) on the other hand distils the concepts into wearable products that the every-day brands emulate.
The gap from high-end fashion to everyday brands is not so big - take a look at e.g. GQ and look around you to see what people actually wear, and you will quickly start seeing the same patterns and cuts and colours a few months offset (because the fashion magazines tends to report on the upcoming season), just in cheaper imitations - for the most part. And you'll see them spreading as they filter down the cost ladder.
And by the time "everyone" is wearing the cheap imitations, you'll see people in the designer brands wearing different styles and the cycle starts again.
It's the same with UI's: There's a continuous cycle of trying to look modern, refined and exclusive, and so it needs to be regularly reinvented, or it will look old-fashioned, drab and cheap.
It's not about wanting "flashy" (mostly; there are certainly sub-cultures that value flashy above following mainstream fashion). It's about wanting "modern" and "high value".
The gap from high-end fashion to everyday brands is not so big - take a look at e.g. GQ and look around you to see what people actually wear, and you will quickly start seeing the same patterns and cuts and colours a few months offset (because the fashion magazines tends to report on the upcoming season), just in cheaper imitations - for the most part. And you'll see them spreading as they filter down the cost ladder.
And by the time "everyone" is wearing the cheap imitations, you'll see people in the designer brands wearing different styles and the cycle starts again.
It's the same with UI's: There's a continuous cycle of trying to look modern, refined and exclusive, and so it needs to be regularly reinvented, or it will look old-fashioned, drab and cheap.
It's not about wanting "flashy" (mostly; there are certainly sub-cultures that value flashy above following mainstream fashion). It's about wanting "modern" and "high value".