Fuck Fashion

As I mentioned in my previous post, it has been a while since I have taken this blogging thing as seriously as I perhaps should. I will continue to slap myself and say stop being so lazy and write something! But I will forget about it again the next day, and only bring myself back to being productive after much self-persuasion. Once again, I find myself vowing to keep up with writing, and once again, I can only wait and see.

I also mentioned in my post yesterday (as another flimsy excuse for my writerly laziness), that I started interning at a fashion design studio, and I have been venting my feelings about this to my boyfriend for the past couple of weeks now, but generally receive no response. As with most venting, you may as well do it to a wall, because the most I seem to get in response is an "mhmm" to show that the other person can hear the noises coming from my mouth. Now I am aware that I am not the most articulate person verbally. I get nervous when I have something to say, and when I have something to say that is actually important I stutter and stumble over my tongue so much that I usually avoid saying anything at all. Which is why I channel my feelings into written words rather than spoken ones. So I feel that I should take any opportunity to express my feelings, however tedious.

So fashion, huh? What's that all about? When I got a call informing me that I had in interview to begin interning at a fashion label in London my first thought was "ugh". I'm not sure I can describe that much better. Just, "ugh". All the negative stereotypes of the fashion industry quickly popped into my head, and I was given no time to prepare for the interview, which made me dread it even more. I never look forward to interviews. I think anyone who does is a complete freak of nature. But this was worse than most because I hadn't prepared for it, so I arrived with a somewhat careless attitude. When asked to describe myself, I blanked, laughed nervously, and said that I wasn't aware this was going to be a formal interview. Luckily, it wasn't. We eventually got talking more freely, and I started work right then, which is the only successful interview I have ever had. And it wasn't even a success because its an unpaid 2 month voluntary job.

It turns out that it is a very small design studio, with just me and the designer working there, which dispelled images of arrogant fashionistas prancing around like tossers (they came later). The first week was great. I worked on the project briefs, wrote emails, things for the website, and some outlines of the company. I was in my comfort zone at least. But in the second week, the fashion side began to creep up on me, and make me feel clueless. Then last week, I joined the designer at a couple of fashion expos in Earl's Court and Chelsea, and the reason I dreaded the interview in the first place came flooding back.

It was safe to say last week that I hated fashion. I spent 6 hours wandering around huge makeshift shopping centres, where every stall we passed had someone trying to drag us in and sell their stuff. I was in Hell. There is no other word for it. Shopping itself is one of the most tedious, draining experiences that people put themselves through. Walking along Oxford Street is a fun day out for most women. Personally, I'd rather jump into the Thames. And to have to shop, but not even shop: just look at clothes, and repeat "I'm just looking thank you" on a loop, all day, almost drove me to commit suicide in the toilets with the plastic cup that I had just drained of vodka. This sparked my dislike of fashion, and since then, I have been reminded of the numerous other reasons that I loathe it.

Arrogance: The designer that I work for has said this himself on a few occasions: people in the fashion industry are arseholes. They walk around with their noses turned up at everyone else around them, like they live in some sort of caste system, and would spit at you for not recognising a Gucci bag or a Chanel suit. Ugly Betty put this cliche to good use as humour, but in reality it is just irritating. And it makes me question why anyone would want to work around people that are constantly picking fault with everyone over appearances. It would be like going to primary school all over again, where the poor kid gets laughed at for wearing cheap knock-off trainers. Arrogance is unattractive, even when it's wearing a Chanel suit.

Fashionspeak: As much as this doesn't particularly piss me off, it does bore the hell out of me. I'm pretty sure that I have ADHD, or something that makes my attention span very short, so when people start talking to me about hemlines, or chiffon, or freaking cashmere, my mind is almost definitely going to switch off. I can write about them to an extent, but when people start asking me questions which include fashionspeak and expect a response, I wonder when I ever gave the impression that these terms would stick in my mind. Kind of like throwing cushions at the ceiling and looking surprised when they don't stay there, It's just not going to happen.

Frivolity: I suppose this is somewhat arrogant, but I just don't get it. I can appreciate certain Haute Couture fashion shows, when the clothes are more like an art form than anything a person would wear in reality. I can appreciate this because I appreciate art. But unfortunately, the vast majority of fashion is not art. It's just a strip of material stitched together, and no amount of jargon is going to make me see a maxi dress as anything other than a sheet with a hole in it. I like books, I like art, I like art-house cinema. I like discussing philosophy and politics, because they actually matter. Discussing high street fashion, to me, is like watching reality TV: frivolous, mind-numbing, and ultimately meaningless. Now I know many fashionistas would beg to differ: I recall the scene in the Devil Wears Prada involving the two blue belts all too well. But those belts did look exactly the same, and a pretentious spiel about the history of that certain shade of blue didn't really change anything.

Ethics: Moving on to a more serious reason; there is everything that fashion stands for. It has become obvious over the past three weeks that my work associates and I have completely opposing views when it comes to production. I used to take an interest in fashion, when I was at university. But it occurred to me that there are certain aspects of the industry that don't look as though they are set to die any time soon: one of these, is fur. I won't begin to describe just how much I utterly despise fur. And since it is included in almost every single fashion show, thanks to a certain nazi fuck named Anna Wintour, who brought it back from the grave, I cut my interest in fashion shortly after it started. There is just no possible way that I could be involved and interested in an industry that is driving in the opposite direction to myself by way of ideologies. Just hearing the people I work with talk about how beautiful fur coats are turned my stomach last week. I'll do my best to look past it for the time being, along with the people working in sweatshops in India and China, to produce this overpriced crap for next to nothing. But I'd never last in a world where fur is seen as anything other than sickening.

Personality: Perhaps my biggest problem, in the forefront of it all, is that fashion doesn't seem to allow for personal style. All this talk of fads, trends, and the latest colours and prints from the latest lines, gives me the impression that there is a rulebook somewhere. And that if you deviate from it, it results in complete disgrace at the hands of the vampiric fashionistas who feed on the shame of other people's bad clothing choices (Very much like a gossip magazine, another thing I absolutely loathe). But why should people follow the path designated by the fashion elite exactly? What does it matter? I just can't be arsed to think about what I'm wearing every single day. Usually I just wear running shoes, shorts and a teeshirt. Why? Because they are comfortable! I don't care that they look kind of stupid. Those dogs that look like bath mats look stupid, but they deal with it and move on. I have nothing against people with the motto "fashion over comfort", but don't expect every person on the planet to give a fuck about it. Even when I do wear expensive clothes and make an effort when I go to clubs, I'm sure that I'm still breaking about a dozen fashion faux pas', but it is far too much effort to consult the rulebook whenever I buy a pair of tousers, and more importantly, I think personal style should be just that; personal. We haven't started genetically modifying everyone to have the same personality yet, so why is there still such disdain towards people who dress alternatively? I have seen plenty of examples in fashion shows, and at the fashion expos last week, of clothes that I thought were absolutely disgusting. The only difference is, that my point of view doesn't have its own magazines telling the world that they should agree with my taste.