Fashion is Important

Fashion, according to Miranda Priestly, is an integral part of our lives.

Not only is it an expression of what we want the world to see us as; not only is it an art form, the most important because we live our lives in it; it is also the catalyst for a struggling economy. It creates  jobs for factories, craftsmen, carpenters, photographers, magazine writers and countless others that the fashion industry influences.

This... 'stuff'? Oh... ok. I see, you think this has nothing to do with you. You go to your closet and you select out, oh I don't know, that lumpy blue sweater, for instance, because you're trying to tell the world that you take yourself too seriously to care about what you put on your back. But what you don't know is that that sweater is not just blue, it's not turquoise, it's not lapis, it's actually cerulean. You're also blithely unaware of the fact that in 2002, Oscar De La Renta did a collection of cerulean gowns. And then I think it was Yves St Laurent, wasn't it, who showed cerulean military jackets? I think we need a jacket here. And then cerulean quickly showed up in the collections of 8 different designers. Then it filtered down through the department stores and then trickled on down into some tragic casual corner where you, no doubt, fished it out of some clearance bin. However, that blue represents millions of dollars and countless jobs and so it's sort of comical how you think that you've made a choice that exempts you from the fashion industry when, in fact, you're wearing the sweater that was selected for you by the people in this room. From a pile of stuff.

And the controversy surrounding the cerulean sweater. No, Oscar De La Renta did not have a 2002 collection of cerulean gowns. Here is a part of a  New York Times article which elaborates on this fictional chain effect of “the cerulean sweater”.

Well, in 2002, de la Renta showed Russian Cossack hats, lavishly embroidered coats trimmed with fur and some beautiful pale pink and gold gowns, but no cerulean. Saint Laurent announced his retirement in January that year; his final couture collection was a retrospective. Tom Ford, who was then designing YSL ready-to-wear, was busy making leopard-print caftans and black velvet skirt suits. Anyway, the idea that such a progression would unfold over several seasons seems particularly dated in an era when the designers are right there with the rest of us, looking at runway shows on Style.com.

So there you go. The speech was quite inaccurate if not made up. Still, this speech echoes with me today because it so eloquently demonstrates the necessity of a fashion industry.

Sometimes when I make posts I start to think, “Why should I bother? Do I really want to be so superficial? Fashion is so useless.” In those occasions, I think back to what Miranda said. Fashion is not useless. We need fashion, some more than others.

Anyways, I felt compelled to share this post after Clare, Kasia, and Camille expressed their passion for fashion and art.

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