Time to Change

Time to Change Time to Change

We view fashion as forever changing, forever innovating - or so we thought we did. Fashion is culture and there are two sides to culture - it is rooted in traditions that stay the same but also changes as they go from generation to generation. We as society have changed and innovated, but has fashion really changed with it?

From generation to generation, fashion has evolved but we still hold women to a traditional beauty standard. From the Victorian era, women would attempt the hourglass figure through extremely tight corsets, and in the 1930s women tried to accomplish this by wearing shoulder pads and belts around the waist. This look then became hypersexualized with the rise of pinup fashion in the 50s, and progressed into the 70s with the use of high waisted pants. The original concepts of body image started out in the fashion industry, but have become much more powerful, in that, women are not only using clothes to achieve this standard of beauty, but are actually transforming their bodies through permanent surgical procedures.

A prime example of this can be seen in Versace’s SS2010 collection, which only included one model of color, American supermodel Chanel Iman. One thing you will notice about all of these shows is that practically every girl is a tall fairskinned size zero model. There is a total lack of diver- sity and inclusivity among all of these shows, that reflected how the fashion world had its door closed for years to those of different sizes and ethnicities.

Article by Monica Santiago & Ryan Smith Modeled by Monica Santiago, Maria Skevas, Gabrielle Simporios, Teresa Jacob, & Nina Boggan Styled by Paige Pandolfo & Casey Martin Photographed by Ashley Alvarez & Claire Reynolds Layout by Madison Rhoad

Fast forward to last week’s Versace SS21 show and you will see an incredible difference in the show’s inclusivity and the evolving standard of beauty in the fashion world. From the second the show starts, you can see models of all different ethnicities and sizes. This show is a great example of how over the past decade the fashion industry has grown to recognize that beauty cannot be defined by someones size or the way someone looks. Donatella Versace told Vogue.com “I wanted to do something disruptive and to break the rules because I think that, what worked a few months ago, does not make any sense today. Creatively, that meant finding a way to bring the DNA of Versace to a new reality and to people who have undergone a deep change.” However, the fashion industry needs mass change in order to completely reverse these fabricated beauty standards, because people will look beyond just clothes to attain the beauty society has continuously praised. How can we say that fashion is innovative if we’ve failed to better the standard of beauty in the fashion industry?