And if that is a given, then the question we have to ask ourselves is not should fashion react to Trump, but rather: What is the role of fashion under Trump?...No pussy-grabbing either, whatever is "blar[ing] up the thigh." No time for fiddling, America is busy going mad.
At Public School, the designers Maxwell Osborne and Dao-Yi Chow... said... the show was about “constantly examining your beliefs, values and privileges and matching your intent to your action”....
Victoria Beckham summed it up when she said (during a preview before her show), “The world is so confused right now, I just want to make my customer feel secure.” In the end, the job of fashion should be to make a woman feel confident in her clothes — feel like a stronger version of herself — so she can proactively think about something else....
The most original part of the [Alexander Wang] collection was where he put the majority of his verbiage: on sheer tights that blared “No after-party” up the thigh. That at least echoed a certain truth. This is not a time for fiddling, after all....
AND: Don't miss the "Make America Great Again" dress at the Grammys.
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These guys are really right on top of reality. Have you looked at the "fashions" they offer? It's a bit like a running gag from year to year.
"And if that is a given, then the question we have to ask ourselves is not should fashion react to Trump, but rather: What is the role of fashion under Trump?..."
To cover the human body.
""There’s just no getting away from it," writes Vanessa Friedman — humorously, I hope!" Which you said humorously, I hope.
"The world is so confused right now"
Yes, and Victoria Beckham is wildly famous because the world just now got confused.
The entire fashion industry is a testimony to a deep confusion in this world.
They're trying to bring it out of the bedroom, out of the closet, but Trump exposed their culture prematurely, before it was ready for a prime-time audience. So, now they gather their hats, don the veils, and progress, awaiting a new generation that that will accept their weirdness and depravity.
Hay sus Christos
Hay sus Christos
So ripe for ridicule.
Victoria Beckham summed it up when she said (during a preview before her show), “The world is so confused right now, I just want to make my customer feel secure.”
That's really a perfect quote, I'm glad I read that. See, it's a Heath Leger Joker line, isn't it? The world can be shitty, bad economy, bombings/terrorism in Europe, mass killing in Syria & Sudan, etc...and all of that's ok, all of that's expected. No one is confused by that bad stuff--President Obama was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize and the Media says don't worry about any of that upsetting stuff (migration crises, mass sexual assaults), everything's normal, everything's as expected.
But the unexpected election of Trump (and of Brexit)...boom. Confusion! And that's what's actually wrong, that's what's actually bothering these people. Not the actual problems, but the fact that they didn't see something coming--that's what's got 'em shook! Trump wasn't part of the plan.
You know... You know what I've noticed? Nobody panics when things go "according to plan." Even if the plan is horrifying! If, tomorrow, I tell the press that, like, a gang banger will get shot, or a truckload of soldiers will be blown up, nobody panics, because it's all "part of the plan". But when I say that one little old mayor will die, well then everyone loses their minds!
YT The Dark Knight - Joker & Two Face Hospital Scene
Lots of artsy pretensions for a bunch of schmatta peddlers, one step above a pushcart.
I was sitting in the dining room of the Rit Carlton in Paris about ten years ago when our attention was drawn to a table in the center of the room. It was a weeknight and the dining rooms was half empty.
That table was occupied by the weirdest crowd I have ever seen. It looked a bit like a clown show. One of the most obvious creatures was dressed in tights in which one leg was red and the other was bare. I could not tell if it was male or female. They were carrying on loudly and we couldn't help staring. Finally a couple at the next table leaned over to tell us they were from a fashion show in Paris that week.
These are the Trump critics.
First one with a solid "Don we now our gay apparel" joke wins a prize.
“constantly examining your beliefs, values and privileges and matching your intent to your action”. This from a clothes salesmen!
The fashion industry in New York used to employ 900,000 and included a large number of small shops that supported it. It now employs 180,000 and the small independent shops that used to be the core of the industry disappear every day.
(Too lazy today to punch in the links to my google search on this, sorry)
A portrait of depression. In twenty years these models will look back and think how dark and unhappy we were. I get that feeling when I look at my 1966 Reed yearbook or documentary film of the Haight-Ashbury scene. How dysfunctional we were.
"What is the role of fashion under Trump?..."
Give a few thousand extremely wealthy but very neurotic women an opportunity to spend money?
Hey, Ann, how come that Email follow-up box at the bottom of this page never works. Is it because I use Chrome on a MacBook? Wish you would fix it.
Well, in fairness, the guy at Rotor-Rooter told me that it was impossible to think about what goes on in my sewer line without thinking, to varying extents, about Hillary Clinton.
True story.
Geezus, we're debating whether Trump is mentally unstable?
I guess if you think everything is political - the clothes you wear, the food you eat - then you think that, well, everything is political.
This is the scary part of the left. If everything is political then everything has to be debated in the political arena and subject to state oversight or control. Everything.
Thus, the totalitarian temptation.
"The fashion industry in New York used to employ 900,000"
That wasn't the fashion industry really, it was merely the clothing industry. A new and disruptive industry.
The mass production of clothing in factories was quite a new thing in the late 19th century.
Before that one made and sold cloth, which was cut and assembled into clothing by artisans or in the home.
Fashion and the fashion business pre-existed industrial clothing.
Donald Trump, even his world view, is not that compelling. Securing the border is not insane or evil. Deporting illegal aliens to Mexico is not the same as deporting them to Nazi Germany. The "Muslim ban" is not unprecedented. His economic policies are unfortunate, but not really outside the mainstream of political thought. Repealing Obamacare would be disastrous, but it only returns the country to the position it was in eight years ago. So I don't get it. What's with the obsession? Don't these artists and celebrities, especially the female ones, have someone else to obsess over? Maybe their own menfolk and children? I mean can't they do what crazy people typically do and find Jesus or God or something? Seriously, enough already.
My wife worked for CK back in the Francisco Costa days, probably the best days for the large fashion houses. Supposedly CK is now a big money-loser for PVH Corp (its megacorp owner).
Part of the problem is that the fashion industry is being "disintermediated", bigly. Couture dresses were only barely profitable in the best of times, and were actually little more than loss-leaders that got the brand recognition. Now, couture dresses are big money losers, and sites like renttherunway dot com means that it's easy for anyone to get a couture dress for just an evening, something at one time that only celebs could do.
Further to the loss of unique couture, trends are created, adopted, and mass-marketed in record time now. How long did the 90s trend last? 6 months from runway to Hot Topic, maybe?
The democratization of fashion continues apace. Good riddance.
"Hey, Ann, how come that Email follow-up box at the bottom of this page never works. Is it because I use Chrome on a MacBook? Wish you would fix it."
You can go to the Blogger Help Forum to ask questions like that. I don't program this site. Like you, I am a user.
"AND: Don't miss the "Make America Great Again" dress at the Grammys."
Didn't the producer say that he would welcome political statements?
Careful what you wish for, pard.
“constantly examining your beliefs, values and privileges and matching your intent to your action”...
Too much navel gazing. Just get on with life and stop obsessing.
Blogger and Google and Chrome are all the same company, I believe.
Professor Althouse to Luke Lea (adult language)
Obama must be so jealous. Eight years of trying to make himself the story and Trump can do it just by breathing. Insane.
I do not know anyone who wears couture clothes, or, for that matter, wants to wear couture clothes. That's got to be a very small world. Still, Trump is part of it. I'm sure Melania and Ivanka have worn such garments. Couture clothes are Melania's work overalls. What happened to couture class solidarity? The fashionistas should rally behind Melania and Ivanka. First they come for the supermodels, then the designers. Then Anna Wintour's scream pierces the lonely night.
Does it make me look fat?
That is my#1 thought always.
Making a political statement is not in my radar usually.
My Ben Franklin shirt, however....
No time for fiddling, America is busy going mad.
The bah has been snatched from their mouths. Eventually, they will exhaust themselves and the tantrum will end.
I'm just going to spend the next four to eight years dressing like the Trump ladies. After the last eight years, it's like being led out of the fashion wilderness
A couple thoughts.
First, and foremost, the fashion industry is caught between political correctness/progressive solidarity, and the reality that they now have a First Lady (and First Daughter) who know, can, and do wear high fashion. First time, really, since Jackie. They could, and should, be fighting to dress the Trump family. Instead, they are pining for the time that they spent their time covering the extra weight carried by Michelle, Crooked Hillary, and even, a bit, the Bush women.
Secondly, I was reading last night about the horrid conditions faced by the runway models. Not so much the supermodels who headline the shows, but the mob who show off the lesser creations. Anorexic is maybe and understatement. > 5'0", maybe 100 lbs, 32-22-34 dimensions, subsisting on maybe an apple a day. One lived on eating cotton balls. All for minimum wage, or less, for the small chance of moving up.
My partner got into modeling young, because her mother thought that it might help with her shyness. Or, I should say, she started training young, but didn't actually model until 15 (despite repeated requests that she be put in beauty pageants and the like before then). Indeed, 4/5 kids in her family had the training, but only 3 ever made money at it. She the most. It was fast money in HS and college, allowing her to graduate with a house and a new car. And, then she mostly quit to have kids. She was at the top, in the glamorous city she lived in, never didn't open a show, and was pushed hard to move to NYC by her well known, national, agency. She had no regrets walking away from it (except for some mother/daughter stuff). None. Even after I pointed out that she could be moving into the WH. None. She hated a lot of it, including that sex was routinely expected as part of the deal (which she never provided). But also the superficiality of the whole thing. Also, she is, even now, supremely competitive, and models are vicious to each other, to the extreme. Not something she wanted to live with.
I should add that she mentioned that she did have some couture dresses, including one that I took her to the Barristers Ball in most of two decades ago. Which, I noted, was silly, because all of those beautiful dresses have been in storage for the last 4-5 years, and we are going to have to start getting rid of them, when we move her stuff into our new house. And, we haven't missed having them available one bit during that time. She has one (large) walk-in closet, with the rest of the closets going for my (also large) wardrobe. Her overage can go to the three empty closets in MT, which, for some bizarre reason, I am not allowed to use. Plus, of course, 300 pair of dress shoes (hers, not mine - guys can get away with black and brown, though I found a nice pair of black and white saddle shoes - that she wants to donate wh n I am not looking).
"No time for fiddling, America is busy going mad."
A common sense revolution led by a madman.
"He — the world he has currently created — is the prism through which everything is seen, and evaluated. There’s just no getting away from it,"
Damn, God did it in 7 days and it took Trump 24 days. Not too shabby huh!
Secondly, I was reading last night about the horrid conditions faced by the runway models. Not so much the supermodels who headline the shows, but the mob who show off the lesser creations. Anorexic is maybe and understatement. > 5'0", maybe 100 lbs, 32-22-34 dimensions, subsisting on maybe an apple a day. One lived on eating cotton balls. All for minimum wage, or less, for the small chance of moving up.
Amazing how the most politically-progressive places and businesses are notable for extreme income inequality, horrible exploitation and human disposability.
This was the role of fashion in Obama's world, at least... http://cdn.images.express.co.uk/img/dynamic/20/590x/secondary/Holocaust-ice-skating-735749.jpg
Well, feel free to ask Trump to pay rent for living in your head. My guess, he won't pay.
Truly, those wealthy enough to buy high fashion have much to fear. As does Lena Dunham. I feel sorry for them, living on the edge of disaster as they are.
"The world he has created"??? In 3 weeks?
He really should be paying rent to all those people whose heads he is occupying.
Steve M. Galbraith said...
Geezus, we're debating whether Trump is mentally unstable?
True. You look at the fashions, then at the anti-Trumps in Washington Square - all brought together along with a quiz on order/chaos in one great day of blogging and you say:
Geezus, we're debating whether Trump is mentally unstable?
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