Pricey and pretentious articles of clothing that women starve themselves to wear just to be on stage, only for people to be judged for owning a piece that was "last year" for something that is so pointless to begin with.
shareFashion itself can be an art form though and therefore can have a positive impact as well.
Having studied fashion, I'm going to tell you a secret:
You know how all of these highfalutin designers are credited with coming up with "original" designs? Literally, 99% of the designs were lifted from somewhere, like the streets, subcultures, ethnic clothing, the military or laborers. In this sense, designers from the fashion houses in Europe were the original cultural appropriators, taking clothing that was created by "lessers" and then passing it off as "high class European fashion" that only rich people could wear.
For example, denim jeans were originally worn by American cowboys. The black and white striped shirt (called the Breton) was originally worn by French sailors, and bell bottoms by American sailors. The navy pea coat was worn by seamen.
A lot of "high class fashion" was ripped off from fringe groups and subcultures that were looked down on by mainstream society. The sweatshirt and jeans look was originated by Beatniks. The "mod" look of The Who and The Beatles--which defined the 1960s--was ripped off from the mod scene. The list goes on and on.
Hopefully my post wasn't offensive seeing how you studied fashion. I was reading comments online about the Golden Globes fashion and there seemed to be a sense of superiority. "That looks ugly." "That only costs that much". So many of the dresses seemed like a bunch of crap put together and passing it off as fashion. Was all the stuff you wrote above a turn off for you like it wasn't original enough for your liking?
shareWhy would I consider your post offensive? I was agreeing with you. High fashion is a bunch of overrated crap by Euro designers snatching stuff from so-called "inferior" or "out groups", repackaging them as "classy" clothing for rich white women and charging an arm and a leg for the privilege. Ironically, the rich white women walk around in these clothes thinking they're "classier" than everyone else, but they're wearing clothing that started out as military gear, labor wear, ethnic clothing or stuff worn by subcultures that they would ordinarily look down on.
That is how high fashion works. It's all about branding and pretensions of class and not about real fashion. It's a very hollow industry, which is why it's always had to resort to appropriating clothes from the inferior classes to keep it going.
I thought you would find it offensive like you were trying to defend something that you studied hard for.
shareI didn't really study hard in the way that you think.
Fashion advertising was my major in high school (I went to a trade school in NYC, which at the time was still a major clothing/fashion hub). We were taught to have so much reverence for the high fashion world and such so we would learn how to create images that "sold". But maybe precisely because I was into the advertising aspect of it rather than the designing aspect, I learned to see through the b.s. of what high fashion was all about. Fashion advertising is all about selling a fantasy out of so-called "high fashion" crap, making a piece of string and some tin foil seem oh, so classy and worth spending $10,000 on. Literally.
For example, back in the 1990s, the fashion industry tried capitalizing on the heroin craze by creating a look called "heroin chic." This is not an exaggeration. It hired ad agencies to shoot photos of models who looked emaciated and strung out (like Kate Moss). Link: https://rebeccadennisvisuallogbook.blogspot.com/2016/02/heroin-chic.html. This was to push clothing that was supposed to cost thousands of dollars and considered the height of "class" but looked as if heroin addicts wore them.
Around this same time, Calvin Klein started using pedophilia/child porn as a selling point, in a series of ads that were immediately pulled. Incidentally, one of the actors in those ads wound being a sex offender: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/model-in-calvin-kleins-kiddie-porn-campaign-was-a-sex-offender/. Naturally, after all of these controversies, I lost respect for the whole fashion industry after being taught to revere it so much.
In any event, hopefully this explains how I "studied fashion" but at the same time learned not to respect the high fashion world so much.
It's great that you can be interested in something and still be able to call things out. A lot of people would continue to learn about things they didn't like because they didn't want to feel it was a waste.
I believe there is a lot of pedophilia in the fashion industry. You can see it by the way they expect women to dress. A lot of these pervy old guys have no standards.
You’re right. Fashion and style are usually 2 separate things. Fashion is transitory. Style is eternal.
share"We Made a $5,000 Hermes Wallet for $70!"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TQF8IkvirbQ
I watched the whole thing, LOL! As someone who hasn't the vaguest clue how to go about making a wallet, it was fascinating. That guy sure knows his way around an Xacto knife and other tools.
I can't imagine wanting to throw down $5k on a wallet. The other day I bought a new purse (the one, yes one, I had had worn out) and paid the most I've paid to date for one, which was $50 😊
I'm sure there are worse industries, but the high fashion industry isn't one of my favourites. There are many talented designers. Really, they're artists who sculpt in fabric and some of it's amazing. I used to think all of it was overhyped, overpriced BS, and some of it is. But some of it has the most amazing construction and workmanship it really does rise to the level of art.
I don't like the pretentiousness and the elitism in it. As you said, some people are mocked for wearing a piece that's "last year" or the year before, etc. Ugh. Something's well designed or it's not. The rest doesn't matter.
I respect fashion designers. I respect their art. I don't respect the way many of them want models to be skinny and trying to pass off some lame design and sell it for more than their worth.
shareI respect the good ones, who truly are creative and know how to design well for the human body.
There are some who have been taking seriously the problem of models compromising their health -- even dying -- as a result of trying to get or stay so thin in order to model. Not enough of them do that, still.
There was one Italian designer I loved, Franco Moschino. He died in the 90s 😞. He had a great sense of humour! He made fun of the fashion industry. Not in a mean way, in a playful way. He called his ready to wear line "Cheap 'n Chic," and his (non-couture) high end line "Couture!" He made many clever, fun and funny designs. Nicely made and not overpriced.
In agreement with everything you said.
shareYou're right but I still love this rant...
https://youtu.be/Ja2fgquYTCg
Thriving off sweatshops in third world countries. Women's clothes designed by gay men so the models have to be emaciated and angular.
shareWomen's clothes designed by gay men so the models have to be emaciated and angular.
I knew some Gay guys when I was younger and they really do hate women. This whole PC thing about them being closer to women for some reason is bullshit. They said stuff that not even the most knuckle dragging straight self proclaimed Alpha male would say.
I don't think it was because of PC. I think it's because people--especially women--misinterpreted the gay community's love of drag as being pro-female. So then women, especially feminists, started feeling as if they could cozy up to them as natural allies. But this was a mistake, because chauvinism and sexism has nothing to do with orientation. If men are taught they're in a position of superiority, then they will be chauvinistic regardless of being straight or gay. Decades later, women are finally waking up to this fact but you still have these deluded types that think that all gay men are their best friends.
shareI still think back to the early 90's when a Feminazi told me that rape is a straight male thing as Gay men don't do that lol. The gay guys I knew told me about rape all the time. Since the early 90's as well we have seen a huge increase in female teachers in particular molesting their students.
So there is this mindset among the Left that some groups are angelic and straight men, especially white straight men are the devil.
What gets me about Drag is that they aren't emulating women accurately or with honor. They are more like caricatures something some Feminists have complained about.
I'm not sure if the Gay guys I knew were brought up to think they were superior or not but they hated women. It makes sense given they are attracted to men so there is nothing they desire from women anyway.
In fact, women are their main competition in procuring men.
shareI'm no fan of the Fashion Industry but there are plenty worse. The Arms Industry and the Fossil Fuel Industries to name a few.
The arms industry and fossil fuel industries are bad, of course. But remember, the fashion industry also helped create this:
http://mixtarhka.blogspot.com/2011/09/beautiful-skinny-models.html
http://www.evilbeetgossip.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/01/Isabellecaro-500x374.jpg
That second photo is of a famous French runway model who spoke out against anorexia being perpetuated in the fashion industry. After she died, her mother committed suicide.