Fendy sunglass earmuffs. They're so hot right now!

So far I’ve shied away from discussing fashion. I hesitate to grant it its own unique identity or pass it off under the umbrella term, “art.” However, if art is the physical expression of one’s soul and creativity, art it must be.

Fashion has the potential to balance at that perfect intersection between superfluousness (the details that make life a little more thrilling and beautiful) and practicality, making it one of the premier art forms in my opinion.

It’s an expression and commentary that follows you around every day, and that you have the power to change at the drop of a hat-quite literally. I was inspired when I leafed through some old magazines I’ve hoarded during the last year (yes, I’m one of those…if I see a photo that strikes my fancy or a perfume strip that smells particularly lovely, I’ll keep an entire magazine for the express purpose of enjoying these things in future in the form of a collage.) One quotation caught my eye in particular, drawing my attention to the concept of art as a business.

“Women will buy something they can’t resist—you have to give them the dream,” said Alber Elbaz, a designer for Lanvin, France’s first luxury fashion house. I flipped through the glossy pages of my fashion magazine to see what that “dream” was.

It informed me that puffed jackets and blouses were in. Apparently the poofy Michelin Man-marshmallow look had never been hotter. One model sported a style that was reminiscent of a starving poodle with permed hair teased a foot high. Another model looked to be an assault victim after a wild night of clubbing who was the lucky recipient of two black eyes. It was, in fact, merely the chic mode of wearing eyeliner for a civilized evening out.

When the ready-to-wear collection disappointed, I skimmed ahead to ogle at accessories, but these, too, left something to be desired. When the most tasteful thing they had to offer was a pair of sunglasses with black earmuffs attached for $1200, I couldn’t help but wonder if dreamy opulence had swung to a dark place of no return. Even the white mink sunglasses and earmuff combo discounted down to a frugal $1000 could not console me. It was official. After spending years as a fashion-lover on the fringe, I was finally alienated.

The magazine had been released last winter, one of the most economically dull seasons in my memory. I balked at the idea that from the cushion of his gilded pedestal, a designer thought that fashion could be used as bait to lure women into scraping the bottoms of their satin pocketbooks to throw away their money over something as useless as sunglasses-earmuffs. The fact that anyone could be so overindulged so as to be completely oblivious to the economic slump distressed me.

The season’s collections distinctly missed any sort of cohesion. Designers bumbled about, blaming the eclectic and seemingly ill-planned artistic vision on the confused economy. “We’re not quite sure what people want at this time!” was the collective buzz. Huh. This was a first. Fashion houses dictate what we purchase, managing to discreetly seep into our psyches and clue us into what we should buy, how we should look.

Then spring was sprung, and designers attempted to regain their footing. Even something as extravagant as fashion could not escape the trendy allure of green—going green, that is. Fashion began to try to profit off of global warming. It’s suddenly quite hip to shop with a re-usable bag and wear shoes made out of your old water bottle. It’s cool to adopt a suffering penguin and walk the two blocks to get to the grocery store instead of driving your Hummer. At one point, Neiman Marcus even considered promoting their fresh new environmentally friendly collection with drowning polar bears in the storefront display window. That season we saw animalistic influence skulking down the runways with safari patterns and costume jewelry made out of shark’s teeth dragging down models’ earlobes. Even with these primal details, however, today we are still acting very much within narrow human constraints. It can be difficult to see actual environmental impact, but it may be more pervasive than we initially perceive.

Profit still comes first as the fashion industry takes advantage of (and, to some degree, shape) the public’s mood swings, but for those who still perform their craft with a heart, they have a valuable tool at their fingertips as they inspire us to manipulate our behavior. Whether money is the driving force or not, fashion has the power to inspire change in our external appearance, but also within us as it stirs sensations (good or bad) and forces us to think about the current state of our society, just as any good piece of art can.

Image Source: Idaho Statesman