No Such Thing As A New Idea

Anyone who has ever paid even the slightest bit of attention to fashion has probably noticed that almost everything "new" takes some kind of influence from something in the past. For example, at the time of Jane Austen, the early 1800s, there was a style called "Empire waist", it looked a lot like this:

Fashion sketch of an Empire Waist

You'll notice that that dress looks an awful lot like the ones in this image:

This, however, is not a fashion sketch from the around 1815. No, this is an illustration of women in Ancient Greece. Now why do these two sketches look so similar? You guessed it rockstar! The fashion leaders of Jane Austen's time were influenced by the Ancient Greeks. In this case, Napoleon Bonaparte's wife, Joséphine de Beauharnais, had a particular affinity to Ancient Greece and thus introduced this style, and being rich and french and famous, she was able to get everyone else to follow her–just like how our good friends over in Hollywood are able to convince the rest of us poor sheep to follow their style advice, whether or not it is actually good. 

Anyway, the same thing is happening today. I have been scanning through all the different fashion shows that are part of New York Fashion week and London Fashion week and Paris and Milan and whatever other city is having a fashion week (Tangent: really, they should stop adding fashion weeks. It's just getting ridiculous. Next thing we know Wonderland will start having fashion weeks!!) and I have been noticing how many times a look comes up that just reminds me of some other time. Believe me, it is quite frequent.

Why is this happening? Is it possible that designers have run out of new ideas? I don’t think so. I’m sure they have plenty of creative juices left. It is my belief that there is a pervading sense of nostalgia infecting society today. Now this is just my individual belief, but I think that because we are so unsure of what the future holds and what with all the new technologies that seem to come out every day (like the colored iPhone! What is this madness??) many of us wish we could return to a simpler time. We wish we could return to a time pre-internet, pre-cell phones, pre-the-impersonality-created-by-today’s-technologies. However, that is impossible. We don’t have time turners and can’t go back in time. So we have to compensate in any way that we can, and in the case of designers, they do it in the form of designing clothes that are inspired by the past. Who knows? Maybe when they get bored of reintroducing the past century, they’ll bring back corsets and bustles? Or maybe in a few years we’ll be wearing leaves and loincloths. That I would love to see.

So, really there is no such thing as a new idea, because every "new" idea is simply just a reinterpretation of an old idea, but really it's all the same in one way or another. Just like all those movies and books about two people from different families and they aren't allowed to love each other but they do anyway and then people die. Yeah, they're all the same. 

xoxo

Justice

A Collection From A Dream

"The lunatic, the lover, and the poet,

are of imagination all compact"

While browsing through the collections shown at the Mercedes Benz New York Fashion Week (a task assigned to me. In school. Which is awesome.) I was impressed by the craftsmanship of many, the creativity of some, and the inventiveness of a few. However, not many of the collections truly struck me as amazing. This has much to do with my dislike of the 90s as a style reference and my understanding that crop tops only look good on those who posses a precise genetic code or a very strict workout regimen. However, I cannot say that I am completely a Scrooge, because there were a few that did make me crack a smile, not a smirk, a real smile.

One collection that I found quite astounding was Zac Posen’s. Sure, not all of his dresses would look good on everyone, and if we’re being honest, some of them really shouldn’t be worn, but what struck me as amazing was the traditional beauty of the pieces. The dresses, full of ruffles, flowing chiffon, pleats, corseted bodices, and intricate floral patterns, all in shades of lavender, pale pinks and blues, greens, with a few accents of gold and rose red, felt as if they were coming out of a dream. A Midsummer Night’s Dream to be precise. I could just imagine Titania and her crew of fairies dancing around the forest being mischievous in these striking gowns. Yet at the same time, these dresses belong on princesses waltzing with princes until dawn, or on a turn of the century duchess, or on a 1930’s film star.

It is the timelessly classic beauty of these dresses that make them stand out in my mind. Not only that, but the extraordinary craftsmanship–it is evident that a lot of work, hand work, was put into making these, and I have great respect for that. Above all however, what is most remarkable is the amount of imagination that surrounds these pieces like a cloud of dust (the fairy kind). Not only can I see the amount of imagination that Posen put into his work, but after only a moment of looking at the collection my imagination began to run rampant–fairies, princesses, naiads and dryads. When something is imaginative enough to spur my own imagination, and has not already used up all of its potential imagination in the making, that is when it strikes me as an amazing piece of work, that is when I remember it. 

xoxo

Justice

What were your favorite collections from New York Fashion Week?