The Italian poet and philosopher Giacomo Leopardi considered fashion and death to be sisters because they shared a common nature and task: to continually renew the world.
The French poet and playwright Théophile Gautier said that one must have the feeling that a man is elegant, without remembering afterward any detail of the clothes he wore.
The Irish writer Oscar Wilde wrote that fashion is nothing other than a form of ugliness so intolerable that we must change it every six months!
The German philosopher and sociologist Georg Simmel explains how fashion works: a new trend exerts influence on the upper classes; as soon as the lower classes begin to appropriate this fashion, the select classes abandon it and look for a new one that will distinguish them from the masses again, and so the game begins again.
These are just four ideas taken from a book as small as it is inspiring. This is the volume entitled Philosophy of fashion, published by Ediciones de la Ela Geminada, with an edition and introduction by art critic and historian Rita Rakosnik, and texts by Leopardi, Gautier, Wilde, and Simmel.
If you think fashion doesn't particularly interest you, I can assure you that after reading these texts you'll change your mind. As Rakosnik says in the book's introduction, the silhouette of a suit better conveys the feeling of a historical period than the most meticulous chronicle of a historian. The four thinkers she brought together agree and offer reflection and arguments.
In this sense, regarding the times we are living in, this statement by Simmel is very enlightening: "The more nervous an era, the faster fashions change."
It's a book that invites you to pause at almost every sentence, to turn it over, think, and draw conclusions. Like for example when you stumble upon the phrase that Oscar Wilde makes the character of Lord Henry say in The Picture of Dorian Gray : "It is only superficial people who do not judge by appearances, The true mystery of the world is what is visible, not what is invisible..." A phrase that could have been said by the beloved Marc Giró, who is not a lord but seems like one.
It also makes Wilde think when he states the following: "Size and beauty have nothing to do with each other. Of course, the cathedral enjoys seeing, but so does the bird that flies above the bell tower."
In general, the four thinkers agree that fashion should be organic, classic and should favor freedom of the body. And with this, it is usually ruled out that a large majority of current designers have read these texts; and even less so the influencers fashionable.
Wilde says that if the laws of dress were based on art and not fashion, there would be no need for so much moving from one horror to another. Beauty always seems new, and is always a pleasure to look at; and you would not expect it to become obsolete in vain, any more than you expect a flower to become obsolete.
Do yourself a favor and read Philosophy of fashion, especially if you share the idea that fashion is, to a large extent, the way we express who we are. And we all feel the need to belong to a group and, at the same time—often in contradiction—the will and desire to differentiate ourselves from the rest. As a guide, you can choose fashion magazines or follow influencers on the net, but I find it riskier.Philosophy of fashionIt is a reading that inoculates you against bad taste.
