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4. “CLOTHES MEAN NOTHING
UNTIL SOMEONE LIVES IN THEM.” BIANCA BARSAN
8. COLOURS, CHRONICLES AND
CREED: THE SCARF UNVEILED ZAREEN CHIBA
16. REFLECTIONS ON THE XIAOFU 22. CLOTHES MAKE THE WOMAN: MADISON MELTON
ENOUGH. BRING DOWN THOSE STEREOTYPES. SHARON TIRADO
16. YOUR STYLE, YOUR CHOICE EDGARDO SCHIENA
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“Clothes mean nothing until someone lives in them.” “Clothes make the man” – a saying we have all probably heard at least once so far and one that I inevitably take various stances on, depending on context. Without any further introduction, I am going to be brutally honest on the topic, as I myself am studying fashion design, hence my interest in the visual and in one’s appearance being very strong and after all this time, I really do not mind being called superficial for it.
BARSAN, BIANCA @biancaomikami
CLOTHES MEAN NOTHING UNTIL SOMEONE LIVES IN THEM. |
BARSAN BIANCA
So to begin with, yes, I know it sounds shallow: “clothes make the man”? Not the other way around? Well, before you are too shocked, let me tell you why. Firstly, think of social expectations for a member of a given community, be it a local or global one: visual expectations are one of only a few things which permeate language and cultural differences, besides behavioural norms. Again, I know, it sounds shallow and pretentious, but I am not speaking here of party dress codes involving black tie and cocktail gowns (although, let’s be honest, they sound pretty fun and I cannot wait to go to one myself!), but rather think of doctors or lawyers or teachers. I mean yes, this is a selfproclaimed ‘free world’ and we all like to think we can act and dress however we see fit, but is that really the case? Would you trust your lawyer or your doctor if, for instance, they were rocking ‘unconventional clothing’, say leopard print skinnies and sequined button-up shirts? Probably not – and this is not to say I – or you, for that matter - am narrow minded or anything of the like, but chances are, despite me being supportive of alternative lifestyles and ways of presenting one’s self, society
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overall has different ideas. Sadly enough, social pressure is what it is and it is a global phenomenon. So yes, in one respect, clothes do make the man. However, this is just one side of the story, so keep reading! Second perspective we can have on this, is the exact opposite, which you have also probably heard a few times, “man makes the clothes” … also true. Confusing, right? More so than you think! As a wannabe artist in the fashion industry, I agree that “man makes the clothes” does sound about right. As a designer, you come up with your own ideas, you create inspiration boards, you collect fabric samples and so on. The final product is your ‘baby’ – it
shows who you are, it embodies your spirit. It can be argued that clothes would not exist without the vision of the people creating them. So… man does make the clothes. In an ideal setting, anyway. However, arguably, mass-produced garments work a bit differently: man makes the clothes so that man wears the clothes, which, in today’s world, leads to man buying the clothes to wear in order to express a certain feeling, a personality or attitude. Which leads us back to ‘clothes make the man’ or ‘I wear this, so I am X or Y’. Everything is a statement, believe it or not, at least for my generation, increasingly concerned with appearance. Do not be fooled,
CLOTHES MEAN NOTHING UNTIL SOMEONE LIVES IN THEM. |
BARSAN BIANCA
though, as we know man has always been concerned with fashion and how it adorns the body and the spirit, and even rebelling against fashion trends or pop culture has created a culture and a fashion of its own (think 70s Punk or most recent trend of non-gendered clothing as response to societal pressures on gender roles) - tricky, tricky, tell me about it. It’s all just one never-ending cycle, isn’t it?
BARSAN, BIANCA @biancaomikami
Personally speaking, I find it difficult to take a firm stand on the issue, broadly because I believe that design as an art form reaches beyond the realm of everyday wear and into all other fields of life: it encompasses architectural shapes, theatrical and cinematographic interpretations and so on. Which basically makes fashion into its own universe, working not for, but not under supervision of man either. It is – theoretically, and ideally, at least - disconnected and independent from social norms and pressures and released from public opinion and expectations. Again, personally, I am one who always goes from ‘I woke up like this’ to ‘Please don’t look my way, I had nothing to wear today, I swear this is not me usually and I actually own some nice pieces’. And that is fine with me – to be fully honest, I have more fun when I find myself in the second situation, which is also most often - so let it be fine with you too. As long as you do you, that is all that matters.
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COLOURS, CHRONICLES AND CREED:
The Scarf Unveiled Tōei from the series Nijūshi kō mitate e awase depicts a woman weaving, circa 1890 (Source: Chikanobu: The Artist’s Eye)
THE SCARF UNVEILED | CHIBA ZAREEN
There is much comfort
to be derived from clothing, by covering up in little ways from social scrutiny or expressing oneself to whoever will look. For some they derive modesty, others flamboyance, and for those in extreme climates, protection from the elements. There is one item of clothing very dear to me that many cultures have incorporated into their traditional garb, perhaps because the degree of freedom it allows, or its ability to be customized in colours and tell traditional tales based on its weave. I travel with one whenever I fly because it warms me and allows me some familiarity in a foreign environment with foreign peoples and ways.
CHIBA, ZAREEN @Zarcchi
The scarf has been identified in ancient Indic, Egyptian, Roman and Chinese cultures among others for reasons of sanitation, prestige, religion and war, yet the mainstream dissemination of scarves as a fashion accessory and removal from the communication of social status has only been seen in the recent centuries. Historically, Romans used the sudarium, or sweat cloth for hygiene, with the most
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famous being the Sudarium of Oviedo, the cloth said to once have wrapped the head of Jesus Christ as he died. Towards the East in Croatia and China, soldiers bore them symbolic of army rank (and even today, the US Army has incorporated this into their regiment uniforms). In Western Europe in the 17th century, the cravat, a small necktie, offered some protection in war against wayward spears, and has since given way to the more recognisable bowtie and necktie. Headscarves have made their way into religious practices, having been observed most visibly among Muslims in conservative regions (such as the keffiyeh and niqab), but the tradition extends to female religious observers of the Roman Catholic Church, Judaism and Eastern Orthodox Christianity in the variants of Epitrachil, mantilla or
dupatta. The dupatta in particular has great personal relevance (and space occupied in my closet) because in Indian culture, especially in weddings, it is worn to accompany a traditional outfit or to cover one’s head for religious events, and the intricacy in its silken designs are true art, and the way it is carried displays the evolution of Indian fashion. Today, scarves are still manufactured in vast disparities of method—they still hang from traditional looms which have come far from their Paleolithic derivatives, and are churned out in bulk in modern factories. Resultantly, handmade scarves have become the status symbol, as seen in its slow seepage into brand names such as Burberry and La Maison des Carrés by Hermès, or into the average woman’s closet.
THE SCARF UNVEILED | CHIBA ZAREEN
The Sudarium of Oviedo, currently kept in kept in the Cรกmara Santa of the Cathedral of San Salvador, Oviedo, Spain. It is said to have wrapped the head of Jesus Christ at death, as mentioned in John 20:6-7 of the King James Bible.
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Vintage Hermès scarves
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THE SCARF UNVEILED | CHIBA ZAREEN
An Indian auntie very dear to me recently imparted a very valuable piece of advice, a sediment of knowledge that many years of appreciation of clothing and fashion, “it is far better to save up to buy one beautiful thing instead of waste your money on ten cheap items, to do otherwise would be short-sighted because this one thing will last you a lifetime”. Perhaps this is true, but when I look upon my collection of scarves, I can’t help but think that I possess treasures imbued with colour, chronicles and creed.
CHIBA, ZAREEN @Zarcchi
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Reflections on the
校 xiao 服 fu *(Xiaofu = school uniform)
REFLECTIONS ON THE XIAOFU |
Beijing winter cold.
A dry, congested freeze that soaks through the walls of the buildings, with sharp gusts of wind that quite literally steal your breath when you fling open the door and march, head down against the wind, to the bus stop. There is no respite at night, and my winter blanket was so thick that it almost could have been called a second mattress, pinning me to the first with such ferocity that it truly shows my love for the city and my life there that I wrestled it off and made it out of the house for my early morning classes each day through the frigid gusts. In addition to the blanket, I kept a hot water bottle in my bed until it burst one night and burned most of my lower back, leaving
MELTON MADISON
behind a faint scar that has only recently disappeared. Prior to that, though, the water bottle and the thick blanket created a cave of almost womb-like warmth that it would have been impossible to find the motivation to leave if my clothes hadn’t been almost as good a line of defence against the cold. My school uniform that year was electric blue and polyester. Tracksuit pants with a white stripe running up the outer
MELTON, MADISON @nomad_melton
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校 xiao 服 fu
REFLECTIONS ON THE XIAOFU |
seam and a two-tone matching jacket with a thick zipper and the school logo across my breast. On its own, the fabric was of the sort that made you colder in the winter and hotter in the summer, but when I rolled out of bed most of the cold mornings, I’d pull the cleanest of my two changes of uniform on over my pyjamas, tucking the pyjama pants into my socks if they were long enough to poke out the bottom. On days when my friends and I had made evening plans, we’d dress in casual clothes under the uniform as well. The blue pants were sturdy and shapeless enough to cover just about
MELTON MADISON
anything: jeans, baggy pyjama bottoms, several pairs of leggings, or some combination thereof, and the uniform hoodie we wore under the two-tone jackets during the winter was enough to cover the rest. To top of my pyjama’ed, uniform’ed ensemble, I wore a giant, thick, surplus military jacket that still remains one of my favourite articles of clothing.
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To some of my American exchange student classmates, the sexless tracksuits were a challenge to be surmounted, a barrier to gender expression and aesthetic opportunity that had to be battled against. Very few American schools require uniforms, and they are sometimes viewed as an imposition on personal freedom. To the dismay of many, floral scarves and fashionable winter vests survived as long as first period before students received a firm instruction to remove them. I take a different perspective. I am a strong advocate for
MELTON, MADISON @nomad_melton
personal expression, and I firmly reject the school uniforms adopted in most countries, which are almost always excessively gendered, prohibitively expensive for many, and place value on a certain kind of western, formal aesthetic that perpetuates the idea that people need to dress in a certain way in order to be taken seriously. Nonetheless, I love the principle behind Chinese school uniforms. They are comfortable and make no distinction based on gender. There is no formality in them to play into a hierarchy of an image of wealth. They are seen as an opposition to personal expression, but I often found that they were instead an encouragement to find other avenues of individuality that
REFLECTIONS ON THE XIAOFU |
MELTON MADISON
were less material. Fashion is, of course, a vivid means of expression for many, but particularly in high school when clothing choices often say far more about a rigid social hierarchy and financial means than personal artistic liberties, the invitation to find other ways to mark myself as an individual proved valuable. Instead of distinguishing myself (or trying to fit in) based on what I wore, I could be the energetic and unstoppable traveller, my friends could be dancers or impressive linguists or city-wanderers. Clothing does not preclude these things, but like many things, their value can only be appreciated once one realises how to be without them. Clothes might make the man, but only after the man has realised that it is not the clothes that have ever made him.
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Clothes make the woman: Enough. Bring down those stereotypes. I have always been interested in the world of fashion. Surely not because I dress with the latest trends, but because the whole fashion business attracts me. This industry is quite exciting because of many things, but especially because it has continuously moving business cycles, with ups and downs we cannot even realize are happening. Whenever a trend is decreasing, someone creates another trend and voilà the business is running and in movement again.
TIRADO, SHARON @shatirado
Also, another interesting part of this business is how people hide themselves behind clothes. In other words, for example, the better the brand, the richer. To make the reading of this article easier, let’s just say that the industry of fashion is just like a “set of social rules” we must accept and follow. In this feminine industry, with some men who are outsiders of the topic, nobody wants to “un-follow these rules” and be socially unaccepted. We must follow certain stereotypes in order to dress-up depending on the occasion we want to dress up for. In other words, here are some social rules we must follow depending on the occasion:
CLOTHES MAKE THE WOMAN: ENOUGH. BRING DOWN THOSE STEREOTYPES. | TRIADO SHARON
For weddings: Never wear a white dress. Only the bride can wear white.
For meetings: Wear black or dark blue with medium or short heels. Never wear a skirt above the knee. Do not wear extremely high heels. Do not show your “physical assets”. Wear a white shirt under your jacket. Do not mix colors. Remember not to show your “assets”
Rules for daily life: If you are going to wear big earrings, do not wear a necklace. Same goes for the hand: if you are going to wear a big ring, do not wear a bracelet. Do not wear flip-flops if you are not going to the beach, except if you are in the Caribbean or somewhere hot, of course.
If you are curvy: (yes, there is a section for this as well) If you are curvy please do not wear leggings, nobody wants to see your “cellulites”. Stop drinking diet coke, we all know you are just faking to be healthy.
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Remember these rules, because you are going to need them if you want to be part of group of people… or not? Perhaps it is a good idea to forget these rules and maybe you should consider deleting them from your head too.
Because your clothes cannot measure your knowledge. Your clothes cannot measure YOU. They cannot “evaluate” how expert you are in your degree; they cannot say how much you know about a specific subject. The only thing that is going to make you a good businesswoman, are not your clothes, but how much are you capable of increasing the profits of your company, how much are you capable of organizing a group of people, how good you are at dealing with financial numbers. It has nothing to do with your clothes, but with your head because:
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Knowled is the new sex
dge e xy
CLOTHES MAKE THE WOMAN: ENOUGH. BRING DOWN THOSE STEREOTYPES. | TRIADO SHARON
Dear lady that is reading this, the clothes do not make you. Clothes do not make anything; they are just a complement of our body, an “accessory” to keep us warm. It is incredible how many friends I have that do not war a skirt because they think they are really fat (and they wear a 34). Women have been penalized for being “extra size”. That is why anorexia is such a big issue nowadays. That is why sometimes models die of hunger (while having millions in their bank account) because they are following a stereotype someone felt like creating years ago. Society has to bring all these stereotypes down, once for all. Women should not be judged for what they wear or for the size they have. Each person is perfect the way they are. I just wonder why we do not judge a fat man in his fifties wearing a suit and a fat woman in her fifty’s wearing skirt and jacket in the same way. The first one “is probably a millionaire”, the second one “…maybe she is looking for a job? Poor lady she is so fat”. Our generation is the future. What we do now is going to have consequences in the next years. Let’s address this issue.
“The quality of someone’s clothes, have nothing to do with the quality of his heart” From Tobit and the Hoodoo Man By E.S Kraay
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Your Style, Your Choice
YOUR STYLE, YOUR CHOICE
| SCHIENAS EDGARDO
Back in my country,
my mom always used to say to me “L’abito fa il monaco”, which literally means clothes make the man. I always believed that in a certain way it was true. From the way in which people dress, it is possible to understand and detect some characteristics and ways of being of the person. I am a great observer, and to be honest I love to stare at people. Look at them for interminable minutes screening every particular detail of the clothes that they are wearing. In my opinion, every single person in this world has the right to show their own style, wear whatever clothes they like to wear and be themselves. Of course until a certain limit, but I have always believed that everyone has the right wear the clothes they want.
SCHIENAS, EDGARDO @Eschienas
It is very easy to judge someone by their looks and associate them to the clothes they are wearing. Despite I believe it is true, on the other hand, you cannot judge a book from its cover. We are in the century of fancy hair styles, super short dresses and t-shirts with provocative subliminal messages. Fashion is changing, advancing and transforming, exactly like technology. People slowly are adapting to this change and discovering what they like, finding their own style.
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I have to be honest and say that I am part of this big change. My family owns a fashion company, and due to this I am always updated on the new trends of fashion and how this enormous universe is expanding. In my country, back in Italy, there is a new trend that hit most of the Italian teenagers and expanded throughout all the country. We Italians (yea, also me) have the trend to wear their jeans in a very special and unique way. At the height of the shin, we tend to twist them and put them as tight as possible until the start of the ankle. Like this, our trousers seem short and our ankle stays out of our jeans. This is a trend that most teen agers have in Italy, and despite it is something very weird, it is mostly socially accepted. Coming here to study in Spain didn’t make me change my way of putting my trousers. Still now, after three years, I still wear my trousers in the same exact way as I used to wear them in Italy. But, as soon as I came to live here in Spain, I noticed that nobody was wearing the trousers like I do, and I immediately understood that it’s something that is not part of their fashion trend. Also my girlfriend from the first day we met with
some difficulties accepted the way I wear my trousers. After two years we have been together, she explained to me why people don’t wear trousers like this in Spain. People that wear trousers like this are considered to be “choni”, something that belongs to people that tend to be “vulgar”, which belong “to the lower class” that likes to wear caps and clothes with the brand name written everywhere. After my girlfriend told me this, I realized that not always the clothes make the man. I personally love the way I wear my trousers and for right now at this stage of my life I am not eager at all to change my style, not even if here in Spain it has a different meaning. I believe to retain myself a good person, and for sure I will not let people judge me for the way I wear my trousers. If people want to know who I really, I am glad to get a coffee with them and have a chat with them, so they can see my true nature, and that my way of putting jeans it’s something I do just because it is my style, a style that I hold and protect firmly from critics and judgments.
YOUR STYLE, YOUR CHOICE
| SCHIENAS EDGARDO
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