Is Fashion Less Interesting?

[Spike413]

I have to say, reading this entire conversation is, in a way, a perfect reflection of the sort of passion and soul that we're all convinced is missing from fashion these days. Look at how much everyone has to say, and look at how emphatically and thoughtfully it's been said.

It used to be that you could sense that sort of excitement or passion or just...feeling...pulsing in the collections of even the most commercial designers or editors. You could tell that the colors, the fabrics and shapes and details and styling, every nuance of the image they were seeking to create, were somehow a reflection of their mood or their outlook or just what they really wanted to see in the world. I mean in the face of the AIDS crisis you had designers like Gianni Versace, Karl Lagerfeld and John Galliano creating clothes which were bursting with enthusiasm and joy and weirdness and life, while stylists like Carlyne Cerf de Dudzeele and Grace Coddington presented them in exuberant, romantic, evocative contexts. Meanwhile behind the scenes they all no doubt had lost or were losing people who were near and dear to them, but they turned that horror and pain into a small form of positivity. In the early 2000s you had designers like D&G, Marc Jacobs, Miuccia Prada, Alexander McQueen, Alber Elbaz, Tom Ford and more embracing humor and fun and frivolity and sensuality and fantasy as a sort of defense against a shaky global economy, a looming threat of war and general political unrest all over the world.

I'm not sure where along the line an entire generation of designers came about that began to treat that sort of feeling as a taboo, or when showing even hints of the human behind the clothes was rejected in favor of something that's seemingly devoid of any sort of palpable emotion, but it's kind of horrifying. I mean the god's honest truth is that when you divorce fashion from all of the mushy, gushy, possibly pretentious but usually enjoyable feelings which goes into its creation -- the humanity behind it all -- you're just left with some pretty (at best) items of expensive clothing that anybody could easily live without.

 

[Creative]

Also, don't you feel that everything people do now is less relevant than before? We had so many epic shows, covers and campaigns last decade. I think we haven't had many epic moments these last few years... It's like everything fades away so quickly, like we don't even savour anything, maybe because everything is less interesting... I don't know, but I have that impression. Everything is so similar, so dead, so boring...

 

[Spike413]

^ I agree. I don't think it's easy to pinpoint exactly why that is, but it is easy to notice that very little in fashion packs the sort of punch it might have in the not at all distant past.

Overall I just think it's a reflection of the times we live in, as fashion so often is. I mean many people who don't like or follow it often try to easily dismiss it as a sort of frivolous, meaningless, surface-only thing but in its own way fashion really is a bit like anthropology. Looking at it can really tell you quite a bit about what's going on in the world at large. Taking that point of view, fashion right now absolutely provides a pretty accurate reflection of what's going on. You have average people with no discernible talents, skills, or remarkable/interesting qualities being celebrated either in spite of or because of that mediocrity -- and the Kardashian family are merely the tip of the iceberg. Think of all of the bloggers, all of the "influencers" out there who, I'm sorry, have become well known because of their skill with social media first and foremost, not their talent or their uniqueness or anything like that, and I'm not just talking about fashion bloggers/insta-stars. Think of all of the attractive but ultimately pretty generic looking people who have been turned into models because they flaunt their either heavily worked out or heavily worked on bodies on social media. Think of every "makeup artist" who has a following and inks a partnership with some brand because she or he is applying the same contoured Barbie face as every other makeup artist out there. Think of all of the "photographers" out there who photograph something totally random, filter it, adjust it and post it as "art". It makes perfect sense that you have an entire generation of fashion designers, stylists, models and more who, frankly, are just middle of the road in terms of talent yet are paid a lot of money and rewarded with lots of attention for doing work that, ultimately, is only just okay. And on top of that almost all of it is interchangeable. The same can be said of every lifestyle blogger's cup of coffee. The same could be said of every superhero movie. The same could be said of every pair of designer sneakers. You don't actually need to examine fashion with a fine-tooth comb to see that we're living in an age where individualism and uniqueness and self expression are bandied about as convenient slogans but are barely, if at all, evident in all of the words and imagery which have come to represent our time. The fact that society's attention span barely lasts a minute between Instagram likes only makes it easier for the sameness to go unnoticed.

Partly, yes, it's just the level of exposure and availability to all of this that makes the trends seem so much more oppressive than they might have been a decade ago, but by the same token it's that exposure and availability which has made it easier for even more people to follow them.

That's just my long winded way of saying that Alexander McQueen killed himself and fashion died along with him. It's as simple as that.

 

[Creative]

^You are right I think. And I do believe McQueen's death and Galliano's scandal were fashion's swang songs.

The worst of it is that there is no hope whatsoever.

 

[D A N A]

I think for us people who grew up in the 80s, 90s & early 2000's we lived a different generation of fashion and now that it has drastically changed we all feel like the magic has gone, it evolved into an industry of revolving doors that are closing and opening faster than ever. To me not only has the magic of the fashion industry disappeared but also the magic of watching it on T.V. Do you remember how magical watching the red carpets of The Academy Awards, EMMYs, VMA's etc? Now I can't even bare to watch those... so painful..Moments like Charlize Theron's orange Vera Wang gown at the 2000 Academy awards... I feel will never happen again.

 

[AnaD]

Everything has become so commercialized with conglomerates like LVMH and Kering calling the shots. They're there to make money, fashion is all about making a buck rather than creating art to them and they're trying to capitalize on their fame and power to get every last cent out of the public. There's no wonder why everything looks the same since they've been switching the same five designers around from house to house rather than investing in unknown younger talents who would bring new ideas and critiques to the table.

 

[D A N A]

^
That is so true, every season I look out for new names, new designers etc
In the past you would hear about more new talents every once in a while, now you hardly hear of any new designers or talents

 

[Creative]

Agree with you both. I think more than 'fast fashion', whas has killed the industry are big conglomerates, who couldn't care less about fashion, they only want to get as much money as possible. And they want it now, if it isn't working in three seasons they get a new designer and try again... They don't want to develope long term projects, it's all about now.

I think Balmain sort of started this craziness. Not in a conscious way, though. It was an unprecedented success and it happened quite fast; all of a sudden everyone was wearing and talking about the brand.

 

[Phuel]

All such thoughtful points. So glad to be able to learn-- and learn to be critical of something that I'm so passionate for.

One factor I can’t stand is how high fashion is so desperately trying to be down with the kids these days. When high fashion strips down to these juvenile levels— panders, stoops to kids, then there’s nothing for young people to aspire to, to look up to.

When you’re young and find inspiration in individuals that are older, even from another time, you’re motivated to learn, to search out, to reach those heights, to be better than what you are today. And when coupled with your own, new experiences and the energy of youth, hopefully offer something newly aggressive, freshly passionate. But when even high fashion and design is ripping you off wholesale and trying to sell it back to you for thousands of dollars what’s already around you, to get down with you, where’s the motivation to learn and grow?

 

[ultramarine]

I find it incredibly boring because I cant relate.

First, I stopped following models because before, they would last more than a couple of seasons and be staples on fashion weeks across the globe for YEARS (think, Alek Wek). Now they go for the next cool face, do instagram castings and models are disposable.


Oh, but it doesnt stop there, I blame the internet and the neverending thirst for everything NOW. Designers are disposable (to me, started with Jil Sander, or Lang leaving), editors are disposable (Have you seen "The September Issue" and the pressure they have to handle?), now it seems not even models are needed, they are casting celebrities and reality stars as clothehorses!

And to top it all off, the business model we follow is with clothes disposable regardless of the income/purchase power:
If you can afford SLP or Michele's Gucci, thanks to the now, -how many seasons/collections a year are there? -, you have to store or get rid after months. And if you dont, you wear Zara knockoffs which are cheap, so you buy a lot and its taking a HUGE toll on the enviroment!

The system is broken. We will see a crisis. We already are seeing it arrive sooner and sooner. All we can do is wait and check out what happens ... this model kills, just ask Lee, John and Raf ...

 

[Spike413]

All such thoughtful points. So glad to be able to learn-- and learn to be critical of something that I'm so passionate for.

One factor I can’t stand is how high fashion is so desperately trying to be down with the kids these days. When high fashion strips down to these juvenile levels— panders, stoops to kids, then there’s nothing for young people to aspire to, to look up to.

When you’re young and find inspiration in individuals that are older, even from another time, you’re motivated to learn, to search out, to reach those heights, to be better than what you are today. And when coupled with your own, new experiences and the energy of youth, hopefully offer something newly aggressive, freshly passionate. But when even high fashion and design is ripping you off wholesale and trying to sell it back to you for thousands of dollars what’s already around you, to get down with you, where’s the motivation to learn and grow?

That's such an incredible point, and I honestly had never thought of it before. It's so true, though.

I think the flaw there as well, besides what you rightly pointed out, is that because it's so incessantly youth-oriented -- and because young people are generally ignorant if for no other reason than lacking experience, worldliness, whatever you wanna call it -- fashion has become just a bit dumber as a result.

I mean when I first started taking an interest in fashion, picking up magazines, discovering Style.com, reading reviews, watching Tim Blanks on Fashion File and Jeanne Beker on Fashion Television, hearing interviews with designers, if I didn't know what something was that was being referred to (and at 14 with no background in fashion that was a hell of a lot) I took it upon myself to learn. And it wasn't even like I tirelessly studied everything; I just learned enough to be familiar unless the particular thing interested me and my curiosity took over. I don't really picture the youth of today, the ones that every CEO, marketing exec, social media guru, designer and editor seems obsessed with addressing, taking that tiny amount of initiative. Hell, they don't even have the attention span to type full words in a text message.

And meanwhile, those of us who have some of that depth of knowledge, or experience, or sophisticated taste, or even just a memory that stretches back more than a few years, are probably looked at as being tragically uncool, or old fashioned, or out of touch just because we didn't think to put a DHL logo on a t-shirt, stick it on an entirely unremarkable looking model, make her slump over like a petulant five year old who just got woken up after nap time, shoot her in dull lighting and call it fashion.

 

[MulletProof]

I cannot remember a time when fashion didn't obsess over with youth and squeezed the hell out of their ideas, their needs for trends, the urgency to belong and gain presence by just diving without even toying with the possibility of abstaining because you're too busy/can't bother or don't care about missing out anymore, which is a new discovery for me and quite enjoyable, and now I understand why marketing cares less about my age group!

I'm not into the idea of vilifying a certain group based on age, for starters that is pretty grumpy old man!, if there was one thing I hated as a teenager, was hearing older people putting down new things created or aimed towards young people or referring to them with disdain. I'd often wonder how can you be too busy building arguments to disqualify something when, if you'd relax, it'd feel so good for you too!. I do think that having more life priorities makes people less receptive, less tolerant, less likely to sit and give things a chance and assimilate them, they just see the surface of what young people are overhyping, something they've seen before but in a context they can't relate to, and watered down (naturally) so they choose to dismiss it as worthless. Ultimately these are groups that will end up coexisting in most social settings and that will integrate their inclinations and influences into everything they do. My "here's to world peace" comment would be that it would be great if people just took their chance with new things no matter how silly they appear, understand their background and just let them be, especially if others find expression in it.

Regarding Vetements, let's not forget Demna may not even classify as a millennial, he's a man in his late 30s, his friends are people over 30, the people he designs for are the same age... people into creative things but with a longer credit line than creativity flowing, they're older, and they have the power too to put whatever they think is hip in higher places (magazines, sites, trendy places, trendy people), so kids get it. I don't think it's representative of their age group actually... the type of classicist/smug irony is more my (or Spike's) age group than kids under 18 right now. I would feel a bit embarrassed but then that would be conceding to this notion that "youth" or any other age group is one entity, one group of people that nods and likes and absorbs things in equal amounts. And that is not true. There is always a mainstream tendency that a majority ends up following, but to suggest that those with deep interest in a field do not research the way I did would be an unfair statement, and I mostly have my experience to say that: when I was 16 and learning about fashion like there was no tomorrow (same thing, fashion file, style.com, vintage and new/foreign magazines, curiosity followed by digging and reading for hours and loving it), I was just weird, it was a nerdy thing to do, nobody else around me did it, the young people that consumed fashion did it in the exact same way as it is consumed now, tacky Louis Vuitton bag with whatever Marc Jacobs decided to put on it that season, just like the younger Kardashians in Vetements right now, and of course the rows of anonymous people that just follow that because it's "hot". The majority of young people (not the geeks or freaks or isolated ones) wore what an older generation (90s Marc Jacobs in this case) was dictating and only now we are starting to see what they made out of it, their own input, which again young people wear, it's a natural cycle, the times are not dumber or less dumb than before. We are yet to see the actual creations of young people and we won't see them until they reach places of considerable influence, in 10-15 years time. So I wouldn't hold them accountable at all for the state of fashion, if anything when I see some tumblrs I feel hopeful, when I hear them talk and being less afraid to express or just be themselves, I think it's exciting.. there are a lot of things that seem a bit sadder (social media, the need to cultivate an image and personality for your online platform when you're still a kid) but I still think that the future creators that are currently 13-15 will be far more exciting than Days of Our Lives/seemingly immortal characters we are stuck with right now.

One more thing to say, with no accuracy, is that I really believe that my generation was robbed .. by economic times. All the amazing talents that were supposed to keep escalating and reaching places of influence, the crisis finished them, one can only think the amazing things Bruno Pieters, Salner + Schweigner, Anastase could all be doing now with massive budgets... instead we kind of just got left with Demna , and he comes from the University of Marc Jacobs for Louis Vuitton (doesn't it all make sense! the rip-offs! the selling you what you wore last year but with my name on it theatrics!). So to me, this is part of the reason fashion is duller than usual at the moment, and it's actually not just fashion... apparently this is one of the reasons this generation can't find good jobs, because baby boomers won't retire either (and have nothing to retire to ), so it's a bit like people lining up to a line that won't move, unless someone gets violent and says screw the line...

 

[Creative]

Well, of course there have been periods when fashion didn't obsess over with youth. As there have been some periods when fashion was obsessed with the youth.

I think it's not the main problem but it's indeed tiresome. And I think this idea of the youth is very 'old-fashioned' because it's orchestrated by old people who are really clueless about that topic.

But, in general, I don't think it's a huge problem. Many brands aren't doing "young": Loewe, Céline, Gucci, which are the most influential brands as of late, are more about a mature way of dressing... The youth thing was more related to Hedi, no? But Hedi was obsessed with youth ten years ago and it wasn't really a problem. And hip-pretentious-youth-oriented brands have always existed...

I can feel that in magazines more than in the catwalks.

 

[Phuel]

^^^ I think the presentation of high fashion is overall weaker than the garments these days. Absolutely.

Frankly, I‘ve always preferred, and am more interested in the presentation component of high fashion than the actual garments since it reaches more people, and how immensely worldbuilding it can be, compared to just a garment. And, I much prefer wearing as little clothing as possible, so owning a lot of clothes and dressing up in layers and layers has never been my main attraction when to fashion. I still vividly remember watching Donna Karan and Ralph Lauren’s Polo “fashion” videos on some US show when I was 6yo and just being fascinated with the imageries. I mean, it was mainly bodysuits and flowing jackets on a gorgeous woman rushing through her Manhattan penthouse from Donna, and just a bunch of hot guys in white polos and chinos playing touch football from Ralph— but it was worldbuilding and that’s what struck me and captivated my imagination: The storytelling.

It isn’t at all vilifying a group, Mullet-- particularly a group whose energy is so boundless and feels so phoney when it’s ripped off and repackaged with an expensive high fashion production. It’s how unimaginative. lazy and manipulative the top handlers of all these prestigious labels and publications are when they exploit kids wholesale. My god, if I see another publication with the coverline “The Youth Issue”…. (or just another publication with “The [insert theme] Issue”)

I’m mid-30s but I will still feel 15 at some point. And when I was 15 I thought being in your 30s was… old. Like yourself Mullet and Spike, I grew up fashion-wise weened on Tim Blanks and Fashion File, foreign fashion publications— even Elsa Klensch’s “Style” LOL And I have to admit, popstars and rockstars who were larger than life were my influences as well. These were all hyper-realistic, hyper-styled images that I was fascinated by, thrilled by, inspired by that were nothing like what my life as a teenager was about. And I took inspiration from these imageries and adapted them to my life. Had I been sold imageries that were exactly like my 15-year-old life from these labels and publications, I don’t think I would find the motivation to seek out “older” individuals, and definitely not from another time, like Brassai, Lee Miller, The Yakuza, Miles Davis, Nina Simone, Mick Jagger’s Performance, etc that were my best teachers to open my mind.

 

[softgrey]

I find it incredibly boring because I cant relate.

First, I stopped following models because before, they would last more than a couple of seasons and be staples on fashion weeks across the globe for YEARS (think, Alek Wek). Now they go for the next cool face, do instagram castings and models are disposable.


Oh, but it doesnt stop there, I blame the internet and the neverending thirst for everything NOW. Designers are disposable (to me, started with Jil Sander, or Lang leaving), editors are disposable (Have you seen "The September Issue" and the pressure they have to handle?), now it seems not even models are needed, they are casting celebrities and reality stars as clothehorses!

And to top it all off, the business model we follow is with clothes disposable regardless of the income/purchase power:
If you can afford SLP or Michele's Gucci, thanks to the now, -how many seasons/collections a year are there? -, you have to store or get rid after months. And if you dont, you wear Zara knockoffs which are cheap, so you buy a lot and its taking a HUGE toll on the enviroment!

The system is broken. We will see a crisis. We already are seeing it arrive sooner and sooner. All we can do is wait and check out what happens ... this model kills, just ask Lee, John and Raf ...

i could not agree more...
especially about Jil and Helmut...
that was when the cracks first started to appear in the system...

 

[softgrey]

i also think phuel, mullet and spike make really good points in their last posts...

what i find rather baffling is this...
before the rise of the internet and social media, it was hard to find info and visuals about fashion...
many people have mentioned how they had to really seek this out...

one would think that with so much info being readily available now, people would be more informed, rather than less informed...
that is something i find really frustrating...
all the info is literally at the tips of our fingers...
is anyone even bothering to look for it?
to educate themselves?

my friend made an observation about millennials recently...
while they purport to place value on mastery, they don't make efforts to achieve it themselves...
(or something to that effect...)
pretty much sums it all up right there...

 

[Spike413]

^ Add Tom to the list, too. I think you're right. That moment right around 04/05 when those three bowed out because their respective CEOs or bosses felt that they knew better and that the brand was bigger than the designer was absolutely a sign of things to come in so many ways.

It changed the designer/brand power dynamic of course and challenged the hold which designers had over their respective brands and clienteles and whatnot, but I'm not convinced that the change was for the better.

 

[softgrey]

i thought about tom ford, actually...

the thing with TFord is related-
but he was as much part of the problem as a victim of it...
he was very involved in creating the gucci group that eventually turned around and bit him in the a**...
he just never thought it could happen to him cause he thought that he was one of the corporate guys himself...
he was playing both sides of the fence for awhile there...
until they kicked him out...

it seems like tom ford's ousting was similar to carine roitfeld's ousting in some ways...
no? the folly of assuming you are untouchable...
not surprising though, considering their long affiliation...
one must assume they think alike...
*galliano must fall into this category as well...

in any case...
ford was hardly the sensitive artist who was bullied and destroyed by the money guys...
his greed and his ego got in his own way eventually...
his case was/is separate and unique...imo
ps-i think tom has the personality of an actor more than an artist...

i definitely think tom was part of the problem before he became a victim of it...
sorry spike!
...

 

[softgrey]

in fact- gucci group had such a bad reputation that they changed their name...
to kering...
cause it sounds like "caring"...!?!?
cause they care............
wtf!?!

...
that has got to be one of the funniest PR/marketing moves the fashion industry has ever perpetrated...haha...

 

[fashion1001]

What do you think about Mark and Estel? They aren't exactly new but they do put on some "new" shows. Kind of a love/hate sort of thing from what I've read. I dig it