Eventually Becoming Naked

[rinue]

It is fashion week in New York, which means I occasionally get to see pictures of pretty clothes, but am also subjected to hagiographic television specials in which badly-dressed male talking head after badly-dressed male talking head tells me how fashion is the center of the universe and more exciting than anything else that has ever existed. They demonstrate this by making unfortunate comments about how New York is being swarmed by flocks of exotic and mysterious creatures and bright flashes of color (because women can be any number of things, but none of those things are people).

This is an example of the problems that occur when you declare everything "art." If fashion is art rather than design, then women's bodies are canvases. Like canvases, they are inert; they are vessels upon which the artist inscribes his genius. As when chosing a canvas, the artist may pick the size and color of woman that best suits his vision, and ignore the rest. The artist does not serve the canvas; the canvas serves the artist. The artist need not retain a canvas once she is no longer "fresh," nor need the artist worry about preservation once the work is done, the strain that might be placed upon a body by a poorly-structured frame. That kind of worry is for conservators.

This is why well-paid male fashion "artists" can sit around talking about how tremendously important fashion is while themselves dressing like shlubs. Fashion in their view is not clothing. It is art that is done to women.

Thankfully, there was a segment with Diane von Furstenberg, who said the following: My job as a designer is to be a friend to the woman. I want her to know when she wakes up that she can go to her closet and there will be something comfortable and easy that will make her feel confident throughout whatever day is ahead of her.

Thank you, Diane von Furstenberg. Thank you for your design.

Comments

[adrian_turtle]

How much do runway fashion shows (which I totally agree are an art form, minimally related to the human form) have to do with the fashions of clothing that are actually sold in stores? I don't see much connection, except in what colors are newly fashionable each year. There are always things that suddenly become fashionable, like flared jeans, or sleeves without cuffs. But that kind of change doesn't seem to be what gets attention on the runway, if it's on the runway at all.

[rinue]

It depends (and depends on which stores). Your high-end stores (Nieman Marcus, for example, or the kinds of boutiques [sometimes label-owned] that sell high end clothing) often do sell what showed up on the runway, although it is frequently altered.

The garment on the runway hasn't gone into production; it's essentially an architectural model being presented by the designer to the people who may or may not buy the building (the retailers). So the runway version often overemphasizes something that will be toned down - big shoulder pads where there will only be small shoulder pads, for instance - to make the garment stand out to people looking at it from several rows back, but also to get buzz (like a theatrical trailer) and send a signal that "this is what is interesting which you are only going to get from my clothes."

Then the retailer says, "I'd like to buy this piece and this piece, but this would sell better in our stores if you made it a cocktail length dress instead of the full skirt and long train you have now, and I want it to come in black as well as neon orange." The designer says ok, and they manufacture and ship the dress ordered by the retailer. This takes a while, which is why for instance what's showing at fashion week right now is collections for Spring 2014.

So there's a method to the madness. In a significant sense, the runway version is not the "real" version. In general, established designers will hew closer to the "real" version on the runway, because they know they already have everyone's eyeballs, have the experience to anticipate what will and won't sell, and don't need to negotiate as much with the retailers. (Sometimes a younger designer might do something outrageous as a bargaining strategy to get the retailer to buy the only slightly out there thing that he or she actually wants to sell, because it will then look like a compromise.)

So if you're looking at Chanel, Dolce & Gabbana, Michael Kors - the stuff that walks down the runway is the stuff that's going to be in stores. (Again, we're talking about high end stores, and there is regional variation. People in Miami are going to wear more color - and lower necklines - than people in Boston, and retailers know that and buy accordingly.)

In terms of what filters down to the mass market level (Gap, JC Penny, etc), it's mostly the color story but somewhat the silhouettes and hemlines. If everybody is showing florals at the $3000 level, then six months later you're going to see more florals at the $30 level. Maxi dresses beget maxi dresses. Gladiator sandals, high versus low waistlines - it's not exactly that things disappear, but they are more or less easy to find. The emerald green that is now everywhere, even in flannels at LL Bean, was on the runways about a year ago and the red carpets about six months ago.

A lot of the "sudden" omnipresent fashion trends have this six-month-to-a-year lag, essentially because it takes a little while for reinterpretation and manufacture, and then a bunch of fashion magazines showing it, and then a bunch of teen magazines showing it . . . and then all of a sudden it being the only thing available in stores anywhere. And then six months later you can't find it at all. The puckered elastic waist that was in every sundress this summer followed this kind of route, although I can't remember which runway it was last year, and it was a drawstring, and it was low on the hips.