Let’s handle with care things which we choose to wear.
- NEW-NEWER-THE NEWEST
“You come first, the clothes later. Reinvent new combinations of what you already own. Be creative.”
– Karl LagerfeldEarly spring this year, I was happy to help two amazing people. Just in time before the lock-downs one of my friends got read of a smocking that was taking space in her wardrobe without a purpose and another friend was happy to become its new owner. This smocking was quite a traveler – from London to Zurich, Zurich to Saint-Petersburg, and finally from Saint-Petersburg to Moscow. That was love at a first sight – the fit, the lining in deep purple silk, the buttons… Then we started thinking about what to match it with. And ended up with a few ideas. For example, to wear it with silky palazzo trousers or something pajama-like underneath.
I was happy to share this idea with a smocking’s previous owner to her great surprise. “I’ve never thought of it! But that really sounds interesting” – she said.
This made me think of a strange and sad phenomenon of our time. We are often encouraged to be brave and try new, but trying new means literary “new”. In the past decade, we have got used to the experience of “newness” – checking a new exotic cuisine, learning to dance, or jumping with a parachute. Unlike the above-listed experiences buying a new dress or a pair of shoes is less challenging, it’s often cheaper and doesn’t demand much effort. But it has hidden costs. Not to mention environmental damages caused by overconsumption, it damages us. It often distracts from our style because such purchases are often impulsive, filling our wardrobes with things that often stay there with the price tag on. But worst of all, “new for the sake of new” slowly but steadily erode our creativity.
How can I fit some old things in the most current trend? How can I alternate the items that I already have? Can I put them on in a new unusual way? How can I choose things that will serve me for years and won’t lose the potential of making a new experience? How can I get something new without buying new? If reinventing was good enough for Karl Lagerfeld, maybe it is worth trying.
- JACK THE RIPPER STILL STALKS HIS VICTIMS… HE’S STILL IN FASHION. LITERALLY.
With Corona-virus pandemic fully on, fashion texts almost got locked in contradiction. On one hand, we are offered the new trends and must-haves which we really must try before the lost summer 2020 is lost completely. On the other hand, this crisis has drawn more attention to sustainability and the ethical side of fashion (or, should I say, unethical). This discourse isn’t new, and its last huge hype was at the turn of XX century. The Young King, a fairy-tale by Oscar Wilde, be it written today, would perhaps be published in The Vogue magazine and quoted by every eco-conscious fashion-blogger. As the story goes, a young king-to-be sees three dreams on the eve of his coronation ceremony. In those dreams he faces Greed, Death and Famine claiming lives of people working at his astonishing dress for the ceremony. Filled with sorrow and sympathy for those people, the king comes to the ceremony dressed as a shepherd… Reading the Victims of Fashion by Alison Matthews David feels almost like stepping into this fairy tale, but, perhaps, much deeper, because suddenly we realize that an unpretentious “shepherd look” could have claimed more lives than the richly decorated royal gown.
The book Fashion Victims: The Dangers of Dress Past and Present is an extensive research of fashion through the prism of damages to life and health caused to both consumers and producers of clothes. The book is mesmerizing, easy to read and feels more like a novel. Every fact is served as a story, often very personal and detailed.
The author, Alison Matthews David holds a PhD in Art History and currently works as an associate professor in the School of Fashion at Reynors University.
So, what is the first thing that comes to mind when we hear the word combination “victim of fashion”? Our imagination starts creating the phantoms of crazy fashionistas who starve themselves to death or obsess about latest designer creations showing off their incredible taste and devotion to the shifting ideals of beauty. It’s them, it’s not us. Most of us like to separate ourselves from fashion, especially its not-so-pretty sides. The whole ethos of wasteful frivolous lavish fashion is built around the idea of drawing a boarder between ourselves and seductive perils of trendy outfits. But let’s be honest, who are the actual victims of fashion? Most often it’s us, ordinary people who wear ordinary clothes and other ordinary people who make those clothes. No matter how hard we try to set ourselves apart from the “dark sides” of fashion, it is here. It often hides in the simplest things, such as a pair of socks, an innocent T-shirt or a lipstick.
The book Victims of Fashion invites the reader to take a journey to the trenches of Napoleonic wars, streets and theatres of Belle Epoque and suffocating factories. On the way you will get acquainted with real mad hatters, devoted ballerinas and cry over every child whose cotton nightgown has caught fire. And in the end of this journey, just when you start thinking that all of this horror is a matter of the well-forgotten past, the author will remind you of the present. Numerous illustrations – from caricatures and advertisements, to X-rays and medical drawings – make this book feel almost like a cabinet of curiosities.
What I liked the most: Despite the fact that this extensive research puts a lot of ugly facts into the lime-light, it is not anti-fashion and it does not aim to criticize “the rich” or “the fashionable”. To some extent, it points at human monstrosity and hypocrisy. Through the mirror of fashion, it mirrors us. When flea poison saves thousands of lives from typhus and becomes an efficient weapon of genocide, it’s us, not fashion. When we stay happily unaware of how many workers ruined their lungs adding the fake holes to make our jeans look cool, it’s also us, and not just fashion.
For whom:
For the general audience: if you have never thought where your things come from, and who makes them, this book will open up a new perspective, and, perhaps will make you more attentive to these details. A possible side-effect – you might start avoiding green garments… and many other garments. Or, you might want to follow the steps of XIXth centuries doctors and upper-class ladies who took action and intervened.
For fashion professionals: if you are researching fashion production, history of fashion, or sustainable fashion, Victims of Fashion will be a good addition to your library. This book especially addresses clothes designers and manufacturers offering a challenge – instead of sticking to “out of sight out of mind” attitude, it offers to take responsibility and take into consideration everyone’s safety at every step of making of things that we wear.
- AN INVITATION TO CARE
When I’m 98 (if I would even last that long) I want to be like Iris Apfel – amazing, strong, with a clear mind, aims in life, loving people around, and with an amazing sense of humor. And wise. The wisdom doesn’t come for granted, it has to be earned. And it can be learned.
As I was watching a documentary about her, I wanted to take a pencil and write down every word that she said. Yet, there was one idea that made me smile on the inside. As she was getting read of some of her treasures, she mentioned that we all are temporarily here. Thus, things do not really belong to us, and it’s better if some things find a better owner before meanwhile they can be used.
“We all are temporarily here… things do not really belong to us.”
Iris ApfelI can imagine, that for Iris, who has been collecting beautiful things her entire life and takes good care of them, parting with her treasures was not easy at all. But she did it. I can imagine that people who bought her things at the auction felt excited because they weren’t buying just things, they were touching the legend, things-Iris. I hope that we can also learn from this wisdom. How to find treasures among the stuff, preserve them, and pass them on with a feeling of magic rather than getting read of our consumer mistakes.
- ABOUT DARETOCARE
My client and I were on a hunt for a pair of shoes to match her incredible dress for a gala dinner at a Milano Design Award Ceremony. We have planned a sufficient budget and literally spent hours trying to find a pair in the right color and size, that would be also some sort of comfortable. Tired, devasted, and disappointed we were passing by some mass-market shoe store that was way below the entry-level for us. In desperation, we gave it a try and to our surprise found what we were looking for. A perfect pair of shoes for less than a tenth of what we were intending to spend.
As she was about to pay for them, I told her, “From now on I appoint these shoes to be your Manolo Blahniks. Please treat them as if they are.” She still does, and they serve her well. Carefully cleaned and wrapped in tissue, with wooden shoe stretcher they rest in a box waiting for their next special event.
This story sounds like a fairy tale. More often what I face is slightly different. Garments, often of decent quality, end up in the bottom of a wardrobe in a miserable condition. And as we go through the pile of clothes many of them go to a garbage bag because “they don’t sparkle joy anymore”. In fact, they don’t sparkle anything.
We often blame it on fashion, especially the fast-fashion. On one hand, who of us isn’t tempted to buy a trendy T-shirt or a pair of jeans on a winter sale for the price of espresso?! On the other hand, we are encouraged to be responsible consumers. Fast-fashion is grouse! Local, sustainable, eco-friendly… We need to consume wiser, smarter better, and from chosen sustainable brands. I don’t mind. In fact, I am all for it. But at the same time, I often get annoyed, because the hidden message is the same – “Consume more!”.
So, as consumers, we are the ones who have to either buy “the non-evil” (read local-eco-whatever-sustainable), or make purchase loaded with guilt, or pretend that it doesn’t matter. Amazing!
At the end of the day we come to Marie Kondo who indulges us with her magic tidying method helping to get read of mountains of clothes (among other things) that do not sparkle joy. Not anymore. Every stylist offering a service of wardrobe sorting comes to share the burden helping to “say goodbye” to clothes. Sparkle – sparkle me not… It doesn’t sparkle – it has to leave. How come?
I don’t like “sparkles of joy”. I like the flames. You can make so much more with flames – you can keep yourself warm, cook food, scare off the beasts, and have as many sparkles as you want. I’m talking metaphorically. Yet there is a challenge – one needs to keep the flame burning, make sure that the sparkle is there. It takes time, it takes effort, sometimes it takes money.
Throughout my life, I have helped my friends and clients to return the sparkle to their clothes. Sometimes it would mean almost a resurrection – many have seen me running around with an iron, needles, paints, and lint-remover. Sometimes keeping the flame – the magic and the function of a garment – means passing it to a better owner who would love it and take care of it. I have seen items becoming a sort of Olympic fire that is being passed from one person to another.
So, here is my statement – dare to care.
It always brings change. It fills with love.
Let’s tackle this challenge together. For the love of beautiful things, or for the sake of keeping our wardrobes organized and running smoothly, in order to save some money or save the planet… Lets’ dare to care!
DARE TO CARE is a part of Stylelabs dedicated to taking care of clothes for clothes’ sake that explores care rituals and procedures to keep your attire in great shape and serve you well.