Fashion week is over, my brain has suffered roundly from the experience, and rebooting is a bitch. But since I promise to deliver some Plato with my Prada I think it is time to get conceptual!
In all of my musings I have been wondering why it is that fashion week is important? Why do we care? Nominally we must care because we as consumers and aficionados of fashion look forward to the release of new design. And yet when one works in an artistic and hence emotionally driven medium it is rare that one can really pinpoint the arrival of the new. So what did I learn about the new this fashion week?
To Quote Shirley Bassey singing for Propellerheads
“They say the next big thing is here, that the revolution is near, but to me it seems quite clear that it is all just a bit of history repeating. There is fashion, there is fad, and the joke is rather sad that it is all just a little bit of history repeating.�
Herbert Blumer proposed in the sixties a general theory of fashion that focused fashion as a process of historical continuity. New fashions are also in relation to others-one being built on top of one another. Fashion thus is always about modernity in that it is of the times.
My concern about current fashion and my great complaint about my recent fashion week experience is that we no longer live in a world that operates entirely in a continuous historical moment due to our increasing divorce from place, culture, or family as markers of identity. This is not to say most of us live in such a sad post modern world, but rather so much of the world’s elite population which drives fashion forward is now divorced from geography and circumstance. This to me means they are in essence divorced from history. I believe it is a conscious choice, made through their consumptive patterns and lifestyle preferences.
The trouble is that most of us do not live in this post-historical moment nor can we appreciate it. The result is that much of the fashion we are exposed to is really quite boring because it is unrelatable. The traditional fashion elite has become dry because the collective accumulation process of design is now one of simple amalgamation. Little pieces with little direction or relevance to one another are brought together for sheer aesthetic impact without any contextual relevance. We see this in the popularity of fusion design, i.e Edwardian English Romance with Indian Influences and an eye towards sophisticated working women. Fashion now is directionless because it can and does borrow from anything without an consequence or requirement to be topical or grounded in a particular historical moment. Ideas and trends that inspire collections are confused as the fashion elite works to bring together a coherence they can never achieve through simple fusion of concepts, time, and circumstance. We need history in order to be truly coherent, and without history we need to find a substitute that serves the same purpose. That substitute has not yet been found in fashion.
But the key question here is do we live in a post-historical world? Is the future of design predicated on a notion of a world in which circumstance, geography, culture, and personal markers are no longer in play? I would argue that no we do not, but the jet-setting elite that sets trends and ideals almost certainly does. Thus when they work to create new ideas for the fashion season they operate on the principle of fusion. To which I say BORING!
Not all design I saw this week does this. I would argue that Heatherette as odd as it is, operates in a very specific historical moment that is tied to a culture that is set deeply in a time and place that being New York, club kids, and drag queens. That makes them interesting and relevant not only to their target market but also as a concept designer for the rest of us because we can explore something true and authentic via their design.
But from where should we draw in order to create authentic and relatable design when most of the fashion world operates in a sphere of experience that has no need to operate in a historical or culture context? My worry is that if we are living in a post-historical world, from where do we draw inspiration and relevance?If we only operate from personal experiences-which is clearly what will have to be done in the future if we have no larger historical context-how will our creations be relevant to anyone but us? How will these designs be marketed? Will designers create markets from idealized lifestyles like Abercrombie or Ralph Lauren? With no authentic culture on the horizon how will we even appropriate new culture in order to infuse design with meaning?
Or perhaps entirely new lifestyles be created out of thin air. But God knows I have no idea how that would work. But when you consider that fashion dictates so much of how we perceive the world and its ordering it seems clear that discussions of this sort have create consequence for larger lifestyle markets.
omfgsopostmodernrejectionofliteralnesssentimentandauthorialintentkthxbye
Well, it is relevant enough to be on yesterday’s cover of the Wall Street Journal. I think it would be safe to say as long as there is money in it, it is relevant. Whether high fashion, or low, both generate enormous sums of cash. The only “problem” with “high” fashion (which is what I think fashion week is mostly about) is that it is actually quite competative when it comes to “design”. “Low fashion” which entails much larger markets and corresponding revenues, is easy to manufacture, as it entails simply responding to overall trends, and then pushing suppliers to the lowest prices–and then in turn simply putting the stuff in the trough for the masses to eat up… After all, we all gotta wear! And eat…
I always thought it was interesting that Madison avenue having the highest retail rent in the world probably serves a tiny infintesimal fraction of manhattanites (and tourists)–yet it is obviously highly profitable.
So I would venture to say that Fashion Week is very important for “high fashion”, but aside from some rich pretenous people–matters little to the remaining segments of the industry. The WSJ article on the cover was about Vera Wang, who (from my knowledge) doesn’t really design for the herd, but rather the JAP.
Fashion week isn’t high fashion. It’s not couture. It’s ready-to-wear designers throwing out some ideas and hoping that they stick. The stuff on the runway will ship in some variation of what the designer envisioned–with a different fabric or a longer hemline or a higher neckline. And the major ideas will be modified futher for sale at different price points. If Donna Karan shows one thing–BCBG will show a cheaper version.
But saying ” fashion dictates so much of how we perceive the world”–well, no. Commerce dictates so much of how we perceive the world. Fashion exists to make money. If Alice Roi thinks she can sell weasles on a leash, she’ll show weasles and ship weasles if anyone orders them.
I don’t understand why commerce is so hard to grasp. Haute couture might be art, but the ready-to-wear collections shown at Fashion Week are all about making a profit. Remember Isaac Mizrahi’s collections–fashion editors loved him, and the public didn’t buy. His funding evaporated because he couldn’t get enough women to want to wear a skirt that looked like a dishcloth.
This week at Bryant Park was about ready to wear, hardly what I would qualify as high fashion. Couture is about high fashion.
Ahh Rachel already responded to that!
And now Isaac Mizrahi designs for Target. Guess who learned his lesson?
Though really I would love someone to respond to the substance of the post and not so much the title. The title is for provocation. I sincerely would like insights on the idea of history and contextualism in current design
“we no longer live in a world that operates entirely in a continuous historical moment due to our increasing divorce from place, culture, or family as markers of identity.”
i would say it’s less that we are increasingly divorced from place, culture or family – more that the particular place, culture or family that any one of us feels ties to, are incredibly fractured, different and distinct from person to another, therefore making it difficult – impossible really – for us to connect through a common history and culture, as expressed through a vehicle for cultural expression like fashion.
“so much of the world’s elite population which drives fashion forward is now divorced from geography and circumstance. This to me means they are in essence divorced from history. I believe it is a conscious choice, made through their consumptive patterns and lifestyle preferences.”
i don’t think that’s really so true… in fact, i think rich people (and others as well) would like to *believe* that it’s true – that through their money, or whatever else, they can step OUT of history in a certain way – but one’s own personal history, and the history of one’s forebears, always plays a role.
“much of the fashion we are exposed to is really quite boring because it is unrelatable…”
this i would agree with, in a way – i would more say that we find certain fashion boring because it isn’t connected in a real way to that designer’s personal history or experience. when a designed pulls references out of thin air and isn’t able to ground it in their own experience, then the result comes off as fake, phony – and boring. this can be a designer working “on the principle of fusion” or a designer who trying to work within a idealized historical past that doesn’t exist anymore. ralph lauren falls in the latter category, for me.
“The traditional fashion elite has become dry because the collective accumulation process of design is now one of simple amalgamation… when they work to create new ideas for the fashion season they operate on the principle of fusion. To which I say BORING!”"
i don’t think fusion has to be boring. if it’s connected with the designer’s personal history or experience – then fusion can and does work. and there are always designers who do seem able to pull disparate cultural references out of their radar and make something amazing out of it – which involves not just taking the image and repeating it, but really making it their own in some way. this, for me, is the sign of a great designer. and i think it has to do from engaging with that cultural reference in a real way – not just using the image of something unknown in order to drive sales. most of the great designers – any of stefano pilati’s collections for ysl for example – i would say fall in this category. proenza schouler’s collection in new york this week – i would say the same about it. i can’t even pin down what they were referring to – but it absolutely resonated. it was amazing.
“if we only operate from personal experiences-which is clearly what will have to be done in the future if we have no larger historical context-how will our creations be relevant to anyone but us?”
i think that the mark of great design, again, is the ability to take an intensely personal understanding of something – cultural/historical influences etc etc – and communicate that to other people. so that the resulting creation will be relevant to others, not only to the designer.
so – to answer your question – while we may live in a culturally and historically fractured world, i would say that no, we don’t live in a post-historical world. and therefore, i think history and contextualism absolutely still play a role. but in a much more complicated and nuanced way than they ever did before.
(by the way, i’m an architecture student, so i’ve pondered these same questions with regards to architecture… and i’m obsessed with fashion too.
The art comes when the designer is able to synthesize his/her knowledge of and emotional response to a set of stimuli. St. Laurent didn’t need to take flamenco lessons to have that style inspire him. He didn’t need to live under the Romanovs to be influenced by tradtional Russian culture. And yet both those collections were masterful.
Having design come out of the designer’s personal experience is so limiting–Ralph Lauren invented a make-believe world for himself and America bought it. Tom Ford wasn’t much as an actor, but his scenario, coupled with the Gucci archives, made everyone with a credit card into a movie star.
I don’t think Mizrahi learned his lesson as much as he looked for new challenges–in the past, only a select few wanted his clothes. So he looked for an outlet where he could have many more fans.
You can tell when a designer is bored with the whole schtick. Richard Tyler’s personal problems came out of disenchantment with the confines, not the other way around.
In answer to some of your questions/points:
But from where should we draw in order to create authentic and relatable design when most of the fashion world operates in a sphere of experience that has no need to operate in a historical or culture context?
Because authenticity is the most important attribute sought by designers everywhere, and relatable is for those worried about the bottom line, therefore not high on a high fashion designers list of requirements leave that to fashion diluters like Gap. It is the prerogative of each designer as to their theme, as it is their story and their journey taken from a part of their history (because to be inspired by something is to choose to experience it) and does not need to be set in the larger historical context or it may as well be someone else’s story. Although there are designers who base their collections predominantly on technique to which a theme is then added to give those who need one – an easy reference to understand.
If we only operate from personal experiences-which is clearly what will have to be done in the future if we have no larger historical context-how will our creations be relevant to anyone but us?
People have an inbuilt need to relate to other people and with intelligence thrown in you have people who identify only with particular other people/designers and their work.
How will these designs be marketed?
By analyzing their particular demographic as identified by market research that’s not to say some left-of-center market guru won’t come along and come up with a totally weird but yep real catchy campaign.
Will designers create markets from idealized lifestyles like Abercrombie or Ralph Lauren?
That type of marketing is really only for people that have no idea about what they want and need to be told – yes there will always be a certain percentage of them.
With no authentic culture on the horizon how will we even appropriate new culture in order to infuse design with meaning?
Well you can think of it as no authentic culture or you could see it as all cultures combined to form one culture and one people/race (and no “Give Peace a chance� is not playing on my stereo!) shaped by the effects of future events and their reaction to them. People will always be diverse if only in their thinking if not in their shared historical backgrounds, and merely living life creates new meanings.
[...] I can’t seem to get comments to work on the blog this very snowy morning in NYC but I will attempt a response to some of the comments made in my previous posts It’s a Small Rootless World After all and Is Fashionweek Still Relevant? [...]
i’m in the fashion industry and I really dont pay to much attention to fashion week….its just a big get together…when i really want to know whats coming up in fashion and whats hot i’d rather go to bleuclothing.com