Tuesday, September 20, 2016

The Drift from Couture to Ready-to-Wear: Fashion in 2016

The popularization of the sample size after World War II permanently altered the fashion industry as we know it and made high fashion accessible to larger audiences. Aside from the influence World War I and II had on American fashion, European fashion houses (i.e., Chanel, Schiaparelli, Vionnet) gained traction and heavily influenced the fashion scene in America. Fashion houses were expected to produce a fall collection and a summer collection, or a winter and summer collection--two collections per year. Aside from the obvious change of expectations the fashion industry has for fashion houses today, we first need to address the definition of said "fashion houses" of our time. Traditionally, fashion houses referred to a single designer who operated a couturier producing hand sewn couture. Towards the late 20th century many fashion houses divided into two parts which included, a couture line and a ready-to-wear line. As time progressed, the initial focus on couture swayed to ready-to-wear, as the "rewards" for catering to the masses became greater. Ready-to-wear also known as "fast fashion" is faster to think therefor cheaper materials, cheaper labor, and overall cheaper manufacturing. While fast fashion is realistic and obviously a necessity, it should stay as the focus for brands (historically) like Levi's or (contemporary) like American Apparel.

Currently, traditional fashion houses that were once prided on their precise couture collections are now ran by large teams of "designers" focusing on mass production. The control of creative direction being under so many designers makes it impossible to believe that they all have the same vision, and more importantly that they can work together in maintaining the image the fashion house created while still producing innovative collections. A good example of this would be the fashion house of Dior. When Raf Simons resigned as creative director in 2015, Dior took many months to replace the creative director. However during this time Dior had been releasing "cruise" and "resort" collections. Christian Dior who founded this fashion house redefined elegance throughout the 1940s-50s with a reputation of creating the finest hems, cuts and silhouettes. To release collections without any vision and announcing new faces of the brand (Rihanna, Bella Hadid) without a creative director is not only depreciating the brand but leading a bad example in the industry. However, the fashion houses are not solely to blame. Mass conglomerates like LVMH, in which brands like Dior, Gucci, Marc Jacobs, Louis Vuitton operate under, have implemented pressure on these fashion houses to rapidly produce collections which are lacking substance and vision in light of the realization of the financial benefits of mass production. This pressure has unfortunately spread to the rest of the fashion industry resulting in careless collections built on minute trends and social media. Legendary designers like Thierry Mugler bid farewell to their companies as the fashion industry primarily focused on mass production of ready-to-wear.  The corporate nature of the industry has shunned creativity and individuality leaving young, talented designers in the dark without a platform to connect to, aspire to, and one day be part of.

While there is no one solution, I'd like to make a suggestion, please keep your fast fashion goals out of the iconic fashion houses or they may cease to exist as iconic! As for the dangers of labor behind fast fashion, keep it local and keep brands small.

Sunday, September 18, 2016

omg University of Michigan
Spending junior year traveling abroad
Cheese makes me sophisticated
Have I shown you this bikini pic
Let's get keratin treatment before we go to europe I don't think they have blow bar there
Beer pic
I love your cross shoulder purse turned clutch
Clubbing
bread
Omg traveling abroad was like life changing so spiritual
I am so much smarter than everyone cause I ate cheese and got drunk 24/7 with the same people I've known my whole life
I am so mature
Let me look for a husband now
Ugh he's not paying enough attention to me let me hit up my ex and the 3 guys I flaked on from tinder
I love my boyfriend
Joans pic! chinese chicken salad
Oops! He cheated on me. I forgot I also have to start a career after college
How about physicians assistant?
Or daddy could get me an internship at William Morris Endeavor
uh oh fucke d my coworker
I'm sure my parents will get me an apartment at the Palazzo!
I hope there's soul cycle around there
How else will I meet guys if I don't have an excuse to wear lululemon ??
Jk who needs an excuse to wear lululemon
maybe i'll skip cycling and just go to whole foods in leggings
wow sleazy much! this pervert just hit on me

Saturday, September 17, 2016

einstein's dreams reassembled

They live quietly

Now and then, some cosmic disturbance will cause a rivulet of time to turn away from the mainstream, to make connection back stream

They do not keep clocks in their houses. Instead, they listen to their heartbeats

each touch has no past or no future, each kiss is a kiss of immediacy.

They delight in events not forecasted, happenings without explanation, retrospective

If time and the passage of events are the same, then time moves barely at all

time skips ahead without looking back

it is instantly obvious that something is odd