Some thoughts on fashion and beauty

I mentioned awhile back that I'm working on a fashion/beauty brand now. I also alluded to a certain amount of irony that I'm hairless, the complete polar opposite the beautiful and know nothing about fashion. That wasn't entirely true.

I'm a bald, odd looking fellow it's true, but a terrible false modesty habit makes the bit about knowing nothing about fashion and women's relationship with how they look a bit of a lie. Some of that is down to growing up with two older sisters, but much of it is being interested in everything.

If you're the kind of person who absorbs interesting stuff, if you have a genuine interest in culture - and let's face it, if you're a planner you bloody well should be - you'll have working knowledge of lots of stuff whether you like it or not. One thing that struck me before, and does even more now is the disconnect between fashion culture in the media - and what really goes on in the lives of real people.

Consider this quote - "Everyone who is smart says they hate fashion, that it's a waste of time. I have asked many super-serious people, "Then why is fashion so popular". No one can answer that question."

Miuccai Prada

It seems that the fashion media consists of either super serious commentary on the importance of a £1,300 handbag as this season's must have and how bootcut jeans MUST NOT BE WORN ON PAIN OF INCARCERATION FROM THE FASHION POLICE.......or fashion people who turn it all into some kind of mystical puzzle that mere mortals are not supposed to ever understand - impenetrable rules for poor buggers who actually work for a living and contend with every day reality of baby sick. public transport and mortgages.

Then there's the accepted wisdom of the 'quality press', that would have you believe that the fashion press brainwashed women into believing they HAVE to buy stuff they don't really want or need - dullards who needs protecting from nasty Vogue.

But there's far more to the female species (and male!) than that. A sharp brain and a pair of shoes to die for are not mutually exclusive.

Fashion can, and should be about making people feel good about themselves. When you look great, you feel great - confident, attractive, individual. That's the real truth about fashion and beauty - but the bulk of editorial, and virtually ALL of marketing around it is about beauty for beauty's sake.

It's sad that the whole fashion industry has come to be seen as opposite of something that give you self confidence. A few preening designers and writers have managed to turn what is generally a good thing into something seen as evil and manipulative. They need to expand their physical ideal in general, but that's only the half of it - much of it is celebrating what fashion does for everyone. There's nothing wrong with having an ideal - a top tier of unreachable stuff most of us dream of...that's the point, but the power of it is little to do with how look, rather it's what that does for you.

And anyway,really silly, inappropriate clothes are most of the point. This is supposed to be fun. Sometimes the clothes flatter, sometimes they look ridiculous - and it matters that the uninitiated tut and go 'That doesn't look comfy, I'd never been seen dead in that'. It's no different to me feeling great, confident and YOUNG when the older generation slags of the music I like - they just don't get it which makes me love it more.

So I'm wishing the whole fashion and beauty industry would stop patronising us, and doing everything it can to make us feel small. In the end, it should empower you, fill with joy and confidence that's the point.

You can have the impossibly beautiful women sashaying into the bar, everyone looking at her...but the girl who feels a bit more confident walking into the boardroom, or the Mum who's new coat brightens up her day - and makes the baby sick smell a little less rank matter too.............maybe more? 

Comments

[John]

I'm not endorsing this view - but the logical answer to the question in quotes would be that the majority of people are not smart.

More seriously though, isn't the issue that of style versus fashion? Fashion connotes temporariness and being dictated to (patronising as you say), wheeas style connotes something longer lasting, more worthy of investment (financial and emotional) and has a suggestion of an industry nurturing its customers in every sense.

[Rob Mortimer]

I agree there, there is a world of difference between fashion and style.

Generally fashion is exclusion and style is inclusive and personal.

[Andrea]

Miuccia Prada! Miu Miu :D

More fashion input (I like the subject a lot even if it doesn't reflect iself in real life)

In a Christian Louboutin interview...

"How many pairs of shoes should a girl have?" - "Seven pairs, like the deadly sins. One for fun, one for flirting, one for work, one to escape in, one for sex, one new pair and one you don't like. It's good to have something you don't like, it goes against the idea that you always have to be perfectly dressed."

"How does a woman feel sexy in flat shoes?" - "With a man at her side."

:D

Next northern planning meeting thing I can fill you with random info about it if you fancy, I get all excited when someone actually looks beyond what clothes look like and what purpose they serve.

[Age]

This is a great post and Andrea, that is a fantastic comment! I will be passing on that quote...

[Northern]

I'll be theiving that quote too Andrea.
I take your point about fashion and style gents, but I think you miss the wider point - fashion is exclusive, but the joy is gives to those that follow it is universal - fun, playful addiction, a game....but at the heart is a feeling of confidence you simply don't get from timeless classics, the sense of rebirth, renewal and even reinvention is incredibly powerful - and could/should be a lot less nasty and po faced than it is right now.
And fashion does dictate right now, that's the problem. But it dictates to you and me too - or we wouldn't laugh knowingly at 70's clothes. Those who are allowed to feel confident choose what they like from what's out there. I don't see it any different from a planner who blindly follows the Fallon-esqu model of finding a way to dramatise a simple, copyable benfit,or the WK approach of tone of voice first vs one who looks at what's out there and decides what's right for right now.

[Andrea]

From a wannabe fashion aficionado point of view, fashion has made it 'ok' not to laugh at 70s clothes. Fashion has made it acceptable not to laugh at blogs like hel-looks or anything, really.

Fashion has changed the word 'retro' and turned it into 'trendy' and could probably do that with anything else it pleases if you ask me. There were some ads for trainers I saw the other day that said 'Retro if you lived in the 70s, trendy if you were born in the 70s' and it made me think for a while there...

From a totally subjective point of view..those who feel confident care about fashion but it doesn't let it take over and control their lives - you'll see most women save up for two designer bags a year that cost them £500-£1,000 each (or both, depends what designer you choose) but then shop in Primark and spend £30 per weekend. You'll also see (if you happen to stumble upon any) women's magazines evaluate things at the end of a fashion season: what's worth keeping and what should be thrown away.
For those people, it's not fashion that makes them confident, it comes from other factors if you ask me. Those that are less confident are easier to persuade and more likely to be influenced by fashion and the idea that it changes the way others see you; to illustrate this I'll find a story from the Guardian a while ago that talked about a woman who only bought Manolo Blahnik shoes. Her reasoning was "not because of what they feel like and do for me, but what they do to other men and women who see them". Again, being subjective, I think most men are totally oblivious to whether shoes are Jimmy Choo or Christian Louboutin (although you can recognise the latter because of their red soles...see Victoria Beckham in pictures; but it's something only people that are genuinely interested in know)

Apart from only buying the Manolo Blahnik brand, the woman was very convinced that it's the shoes that do everything for her - take the label away and they're nothing but very comfortable, beautiful shoes. And they can come from anywhere else. But as long as she believed in it, hey! It proves a point: that she did lack self confidence. I'm not a fan of the idea that shoes sign contracts for you, make men take you out for meals and stuff. They certainly help but they don't do it for you!

Now to conclude my novel, I might actually write a post myself instead of lurking your blog!

[RebeccaWho]

I dont know much about fashion but I have lots of opinions:

I think fashion is fine for those weak people who have to be seen in the next best thing. I understand that it may create some meaning in their dull lives. Sorry, that was harsh, I dont really mean it.

I follow fashions too, because I just buy whats on the high street, because I am lazy. I care about what I look like, but Im more interested in creating a personal style and think everyone should be encouraged to do this.

For example I have always been interested in military style so loved it when it was in fashion because I could get hold of the stuff easier, but it annoyed me that now everyone looked like me. The magazines may tell me to throw them away at the end of this year (or maybe they already have) but I wont do.

On the confidence issue, I feel confident in my style. Stick me into a suit or something I dont feel good in and I dont feel confident at all, I feel very self conscious. I can imagine you will find this with most people.

[Northern]

sorry i'm being a bit thick, but are we not all saying the same thing? when you know you look great, you feel great - some need help, some don't. But fundamentally, that's what makes us happy, it's not an end in itself.

[Kate]

But fashion is like food. Just because you've had one gorgeous meal, doesn't mean you can't have/don't want another one. Fashion is about fabric and colour and just enjoying NEW stuff even if you can't buy it. Window-shopping wouldn't exist as one of life's pleasures if fashion didn't exist.

[Catty Frank]

Style is fashion or it's nothing.

Fashion is business or it's less than nothing.

If you are not the size a designer wants, go to JCPenney and choose from many diffrerent colors of potato sacks.