Doctoral Thesis for the Taking

[dopey]

"Fashions emanate from definite localities frequented by people of wealth and distinction. These leaders wear this year what will next year be in widespread demand. It is through the prestige and sanction of authenticity that attaches itself to anything worn at the important fashion centers that the new styles get their start. "

The above quote is taken from an Apparel Arts article set out in Tutee's most recent and excellent post. It contains in it the kernel of a theory that I would love to write about if I knew more and wrote about such things. SInce I don't (either one), perhaps someone here will take up the thought.

In a nutshell, the idea is that the evolution of men's style and clothing (and also, as a corollary, quality) can be directly traced to the loss of actual men as style leaders and their replacement with fashion designers. The theory is that when style and fashion were led by actual men who were business and social leaders that chose their own clothes, fashion evolved in small increments and changes were made with the intent of flattering the wearer. So-and-so might want to choose something new this season to set himself apart, but he also wanted to look good. As style filtered down from the innovators to everyone else, what was filtering down was what actually looked good (or what the power of personality could convince people looked good).

Designers have an entirely different objective - their job is to make a career for themselves (not the wearers of their clothes) by being innovative, clever and celebrated. The houses that employ them want obsolescence so that new clothes are sold as often as possible. The mechanism by which clothes now go from the designer to the celebrity to the magazine to the wearers is fundamentally different than style going from the innovative wearer/tailor to the magazine/retailer to the end-wearer. The fact that the innovators were of a social set (or a few sets) inclined to copy one another only reinforced the crucible by which modest innovations were tested and rolled out.

When the job of the innovator is to look good himself you get good innovation. When the job of the innovator is to make a career for himself with his clever ideas, novelty and celebrity, you get silly, disposable clothing.


Anyhow, I have written enough. I would be curious to know what you think and would be grateful if some enterprising scholar stole my idea (to the extent it is mine) and ran with it. I look forward to reading the results.

[RWS]

I´ll agree with Dopey, at least so far as he´s opined regarding "designers". But I lack time, knowledge, and, perhaps, sufficient interest to expand the scope of his well-phrased summary.

[dopey]

There is another element or two that I would like to add. I noted on styleforum that a friend was asking me about Thom Browne suits and that while I had seen two instances of people wearing Thom Browne clothes, I could not comment on their quality. Moreover the quality, and even the fit, were irrelevant. As far as I could tell, all I was supposed to notice was that the guy was wearing a Thom Browne suit. In other words, the focus was on the designer not the man. This same point is evident when you look at some of the runway photos of men in designer three piece suits recently posted on styleforum. Again, the emphasis is on the "look" rather than on the man. What you notice is that a guy is wearing a three piece suit with some bizarre quirks of fit or cut and a strange accessory. The models look visibly uncomfortable in their clothes as even for the show, the emphasis is on displaying the look rather than fitting (and displaying) the man. It is no great stretch to arrive at the point where fit goes from being irrelevant to being forgotten. If men wear badly fitting clothes from Gucci or Dior or wherever, there is no reason to expect people lower down on the spending and manufacturing chain to do any better. It ceases to matter. Of course, the same applies to quality. Quality declines because it doesn't matter - neither to the wearer nor the designer.

[countdemoney]

Interesting post. It is that corruption of style which led me to bespoke. The lack of life in the pre-made, mass produced nonsense. It always seemed to lack, well, character.

I am often reminded of Guy Debords notes on drinking:

I have wandered extensively in several great European cities, and I appreciated everything that deserved it. The catalogue on this subject could be vast. There were the beers of England, where mild and bitter were mixed in pints; the big schooners of Munich; and the Irish; and the most classical, the Czech beer of Pilsen; and the admirable baroquism of the Gueuze around Brussels, when it had its distinct flavour in each artisanal brasserie and did not travel well. There were the fruit liqueurs of Alsace; the rum of Jamaica; the punches, the aquavit of Aalborg, and the grappa of Turin, cognac, cocktails; the incomparable mezcal of Mexico. There were all the wines of France, the loveliest coming from Burgundy; there were the wines of Italy, and especially the Barolos of Langhe, the Chiantis of Tuscany; there were the wines of Spain, the Riojas of Old Castille or the Jumilla of Murcia.

.
.
.

The majority of wines, almost all spirits, and every one of the beers whose memory I have evoked here have today completely lost their tastes — first on the world market and then locally — with the progress of industry as well as the disappearance or economic re-education of the social classes that had long remained independent of large industrial production, and so too of the various regulations that now prohibit virtually anything that is not industrially produced. The bottles, so that they can still be sold, have faithfully retained their labels; this attention to detail provides the assurance that one can photograph them as they used to be, not drink them.

Neither I nor the people who drank with me have at any moment felt embarrassed by our excesses. “At the banquet of life” — good guests there, at least — we took a seat without thinking even for an instant that what we were drinking with such prodigality would not subsequently be replenished for those who would come after us. In drinking memory, no one had ever imagined that he would see drink pass away before the drinker.

http://www.chez.com/debordiana/english/panegyric.htm

I continually war with myself between uniqueness in color and pattern and subtly standing out with attention to everyday detail. The lounge has always struck me as celebrating the latter in service to championing the individual.

[yachtie]

This is an excellent topic and I agree with dopey completely. No where is this seen more than in the realm of women's fashion. It is there that the ascendency of the "fashion designer' has held sway the longest and the effects have been the most felt. It is a rare occurrence, whether by design or, more likely, by chance that a particular outfit actually flatters the woman that's wearing it. Extremes in cut and style are the stock in trade of women's design houses and as we can see this same model has also taken over men's clothing.
It should be no surprise that a Thom Browne is now a favorite. Most men, who consider themselves stylish dress like women. Not in the actual clothing items themselves but in their attitude towards clothes- novelty over longevity, fashion over style, look over substance. The fundamental idea fostered here that ones clothes should make the wearer look good is completely lost on these people. The really want to be noticed for wearing some designer item that objectively looks bad on them-just like women.

[HappyStroller]

Talking about wine, I had the privilege of wine tasting with a group of businessmen who were thinking of dining formally in dinner jackets recently. At the last dinner sometime before world stock markets started getting spooked by developments in the U.S. sub-prime market, some one brought along a bottle of French wine with the brand Prvst, IIRC. Since then, I can't bear to drink any other wine. I was a told a bottle of Prvst of 1982 vintage would probably fetch $10,000! It was a wonderful $1,000 worth that I was fortunate to partake. And the next time some one brings along to your table with such great generosity, you know it's time to liquidate all your stocks.

Interesting post. It is that corruption of style which led me to bespoke. The lack of life in the pre-made, mass produced nonsense. It always seemed to lack, well, character.

...<SNIPPED>...

The majority of wines, almost all spirits, and every one of the beers whose memory I have evoked here have today completely lost their tastes — first on the world market and then locally — with the progress of industry as well as the disappearance or economic re-education of the social classes that had long remained independent of large industrial production, and so too of the various regulations that now prohibit virtually anything that is not industrially produced. The bottles, so that they can still be sold, have faithfully retained their labels; this attention to detail provides the assurance that one can photograph them as they used to be, not drink them.

Neither I nor the people who drank with me have at any moment felt embarrassed by our excesses. “At the banquet of life” — good guests there, at least — we took a seat without thinking even for an instant that what we were drinking with such prodigality would not subsequently be replenished for those who would come after us. In drinking memory, no one had ever imagined that he would see drink pass away before the drinker.

http://www.chez.com/debordiana/english/panegyric.htm

I continually war with myself between uniqueness in color and pattern and subtly standing out with attention to everyday detail. The lounge has always struck me as celebrating the latter in service to championing the individual.

[couch]

HS, I've never heard of a premium French wine called Prvst. That's hardly definitive, but were you perhaps thinking of Chateau Petrus? An '82 Petrus might possibly fetch $10K in Asia at a restaurant. $10K for a case would be reasonable now. The Australian Wine Index says that during the Asian financial crisis of 1997 a bottle of '82 Petrus was selling for $1700 / bottle . . . . Here's the label:

[MTM]

In a nutshell, the idea is that the evolution of men's style and clothing (and also, as a corollary, quality) can be directly traced to the loss of actual men as style leaders and their replacement with fashion designers.

The NY Times profiled a book today w/ a similar thesis focusing on luxury rather than style. A sample:

" 'Luxury wasn’t simply a product,' Ms. Thomas writes. 'It denoted a history of tradition, superior quality, and often a pampered buying experience.'

'Luxury was a natural and expected element of upper-class life, like belonging to the right clubs or having the right surname. And it was produced in small quantities — often made to order — for an extremely limited and truly elite clientele.'

Enter the villains of Ms. Thomas’ book, the 35 leading luxury brands that now control over 60 percent of the global market. The list includes Prada, Gucci, Giorgio Armani, Hermès and Chanel, all of which have revenue in excess of $1 billion a year. But the “Mr. Big” of the big luxury is LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton, an $11 billion conglomerate whose labels also include Dior, Fendi and Berluti."


The book is “Deluxe: How Luxury Lost Its Luster,” by Dana Thomas
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/19/busin ... ref=slogin

The preference for organic growth reminds me of Jane Jacobs work on cities. I am all for organic growth, but believe it can, for better and worse, come from below as well as from above.

Mark

[HappyStroller]

Yes, indeed you're correct, Couch. Petrvs is the one. Many thanks for giving all the other gentlemen here a chance to look at that label.

HS, I've never heard of a premium French wine called Prvst. That's hardly definitive, but were you perhaps thinking of Chateau Petrus? An '82 Petrus might possibly fetch $10K in Asia at a restaurant. $10K for a case would be reasonable now. The Australian Wine Index says that during the Asian financial crisis of 1997 a bottle of '82 Petrus was selling for $1700 / bottle . . . . Here's the label:

[MTM]

... Moreover the quality, and even the fit, were irrelevant. As far as I could tell, all I was supposed to notice was that the guy was wearing a Thom Browne suit. In other words, the focus was on the designer not the man. This same point is evident when you look at some of the runway photos of men in designer three piece suits recently posted on styleforum. Again, the emphasis is on the "look" rather than on the man....

Reading through this page again, I was struck again by others' wisdom, particularly in this passage.

[HappyStroller]

Dopey's style and fashion, design and fit, the look, etc. Plus Alden's taste.

Of course, add function.

Let me bring up a concrete example.

I had a smoking jacket made of luxurious bottle green silk velvet. The collar and shawl-type lapel were in one piece made from burgundy Shantung silk; same for the cuffs and pockets. Lapels, cuffs and pockets plus the Chinese link knot were of thick yellowish golden silk cord.

The sleeves were not attached at the shoulders, but were simply extensions of the jacket body. The pockets had flaps with borders only on the sides and bottoms of the pockets. Finally, the jacket was hip length.

Smoking jackets are of course out of fashion presently.

Style-wise, the seamless Chinese style sleeves did not help in making the jacket look fitted. I had intended the pockets had top facings which the clothier interpreted as flaps. So she had left out the braidings at the top of the pockets, which would have given the jacket a better look.

As for taste, the choice of extremely contrasting colours turned the jacket into something horribly shocking, fit for Fu Manchu, perhaps.

One important point left out was that the smoking jacket had inner linings padded with raw silk. This specification, which has nothing to do with the typical specifications for a smoking jacket, was insisted on last December as the smoking jacket was intended to be a Winter jacket used in a house without any form of heating (to save electricity costs). Coupled with the easy to wear Chinese-style sleeves, I believe that was the saving grace which led me to treat this shocking garment as essential for home wear during this especially cold Shanghai Winter.

The jacket's hip length proved to be a slight irritant, because I like to slouch horizontally on a bed while watching the State-censored TV during the day. Other than that, I'd say the jacket performed well function-wise.

There are at three things I'd do the next time I attempt to make another smoking jacket.

Taste-wise, there'd be less contrast. For example, just bottle-green silk velvet and black silk lapels, cuffs and pocket tops. The only elaboration may be the existence of self-colour patterns for a more sophisticated look.

There will be no pocket flaps. The pockets will not be patched pockets.

I will consider a shorter jacket that reaches down to just above the groin and hips.

In other words, I'd think the next jacket will look smarter and be even more functional.

Another thing about taste, I think it is either inherent or acquired via cultivation perhaps by the wearer; otherwise how can he think of what can be done to improve his next jacket?