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The practicality (or lack theorf) of designer cluthing


homi29

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Being on superfuture or similar online communities, we tend to normalize the idea of buying designer clothes at high prices. That being said, what i've struggled with personally is the practicality (or lack therof) of designer clothes for my own personal lifestyle.

While i'd like to be able to buy and wear a lot of the stuff shown in this sub-forum, what is holding me back (besides my relatively poor paying job) is the idea that the higher end shit doesn't necessarily fit into my day to day lifestyle. I can't imagine wearing dior or raf dress shirts to work everyday and essentially wearing them down.

I go to alot of parties/concerst and believe that sometimes nothing is more comfortable than a tee, or maybe a zip-up hoody.

I can't really imagine showing up goth-ninja'ed out to a family dinner, or bowling with friends.. etc etc etc.

this is not to slight any of you who can pull this off day in and day out (in fact i am slightly envious of the fact that i cannot afford to / don't have the suitable lifestyle for it)

How do you fit in your nicer stuff into your life. When do you wear it? How do you decide what's worth getting (especially when you might not see yourself wearing it all that often.

Just some questions i thought were worth posing

cliffs : wearing really ballin designer shit seems to be incongruent with alot of lifestyles/budgets

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It's about taking nice pieces and working them into your wardrobe. In addition, it's about matching colors, textures, and styles to produce an interesting outfit. One of the easiest ways to recognize a try-hard douchebag who has no style is a head-to-toe designer-wear outfit..... very, very rarely does this look good or work. Oftentimes a well-made cheap basic piece works better than an extravagantly-priced subtly-logoed designer piece.

Except shoes: you should always wear nice shoes.

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clothing should be an expression of yourself...i imagine if a person has genuine interest in clothing they would be able to accept what would work on them and what wouldn't and generally gravitate towards pieces/colours that best accentuates their body type/skin tone etc..

those who are only in it for the hype usually pull it off awkwardly..

this is regardless of the label or pricing..

as for occasion wise i always felt its more of a perspective thing...i don't imagine that someone who is labeled as a 'goth ninja' would really be a goth ninja..only precieved by others as such. IF they're comfortable in their own skin with the 'goth ninja' clothing they've got on then it doesn't matter where they're at in my opinion..they're able to 'pull' it off and yah, maybe people would notice him and he would stand out but in my humble opinion its in a good way..

I think that someone who is dressed down to the T for certain functions would still carry that 'style' they have over to more 'simple' pieces..

i guess thats what it comes down to more then anything... not the clothing you're wearing but how you're wearing it..

styling it..

whatever, however you want to label it.

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i think for menswear, head to toe designer outfits (not meaning a runway copy, but like an ensemble that incorporates a designer piece for each part) are more practical than for womenswear. I think it's pretty easy...you can wear a nice suit and shoes for any occasion, make it dressy or casual. Most of my outfits i would say are about 80% composed of designer pieces and i've never seen a problem with function. Then again I tend to stay away from a lot of pieces that look like they may take 10 minutes just to put on or anything too exaggerated. Place more emphasis on quality and proportions, if you have the first you can play around all you want with the latter. Just experiment and see what you're comfortable with.

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if you are having this delimma

then you should just get what you feel/were comfortable in and not because what this forum sucks you into getting.

if you still insist to experiment with or wear designer clothings and such which doesn't really reflect your lifestyle, then yes like people that have stated, mix it up.

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a nice suit always works.

shoes are a must.

avant garde clothing doesnt work on mos people. and those outfits dont work in most situations, unless you work at a clothing store that sells that type of clothing or you are an artist or you are a really rich trust fund kid, and dont have to work.

its awfully perty tho

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dont forget the swagger part of the equation

i remember being in seattle once, and i remeber this guy walked by who i thought was homeless just based on what he was wearing... lots of layers, dark greens, browns... camo and pockets, shaved head

i did a double take though, because it certainly didnt look like dude was dressed the way i usually see homeless dressed

i just thought, shiiiiit, that guys got fuckin style

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....IF they're comfortable in their own skin with the 'goth ninja' clothing they've got on then it doesn't matter where they're at in my opinion..they're able to 'pull' it off and yah, maybe people would notice him and he would stand out but in my humble opinion its in a good way..

agreed. i recently met up with still for a sale, and he clearly stood out as the steeziest person on the block despite appearing out of place, but it was definitely in a good way. if i didn't recognize the bag and rosary and know it was him, i would've looked twice in appreciation all the same

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this is a very good topic. perhaps SZ can give you a more indepth conversation if you haven't found what your searching for.

++apologise for name dropping. its the only way i could demonstrate my points++

i think its important to take into accound the lives these members/people lead. some are in the particular industry, some are city dwellers, and some are common people who incorporate these "high fashion" garments and downplay (for lack of a better word) them

i'll start with the latter statement first. some people live relatively normal lives say a nine to five job, average career and are able to wear these garments because every extensive item is built up on a basic item. the pockets, cuts, and fabric of a leather jacket is still a leather jacket at heart. denim is denim no matter the cut, color or the coating on it. it may seem confusing as i know if i read this i would be confused myself but take for instance digital denim. he is an avid high fashion consumer of ann d., dbss, neil barrett. his closet seems stacked full of runway cards. yet if you saw him on the street on a normal day most common folk would not look twice besides the fact that he's wearing all black in a predominate society that favors lighter colors. now i don't know much about this members personal life besides what i have aquired through the internet. and it is my understanding that he is in the medical field?(correct me if im mistaken) i believe his occupation is not of glitz and glamour say of a member in the fashion industry like mouko or 2000hb (a model? am i correct) now these men are in the fashion industry which "allows" avant garde designers like yohji, junya, cdg, raf. now say if 2000hb were to walk into his work enviroment head to toe in the above mentioned designers. hardly anyone would look twice (besides taking in the details) because it is the enviroment that they are acustomed to.

city also has a lot to take into account for the way one dresses. fuse the above point with the current point which leads me to other members like sbw4224 and SZ member buckwheat (forgive me im terrible with spelling user names). now they dress in what many say upscale fashion.patrik ervell for sbw, bw and ftb even for yohji. yet they down seem to down play what they wear to blend in with there enviroment. high fashion among common folk for the sake of enviroment and occupationis the message that a seem to get from them when i see there waywt pics. in all three cases dd, sbw, and bw seem to take high fashion and subtract the high which in my deffinition is style/steez/swagger. which would be the ability to intergrate interests, morals, beliefs, history and reflect it as if they are an open book for everyone to read. yet few however are able to read, much more understand the connotations because the words are encoded in the items they wear right down to the way they lace there footwear to there choice of color. i believe true artists are perfectionist at heart. the way sb,sal78 and milspec pinroll, tuck in, layer or the simplicity to the extensive layers that diamonds uses. my eyes absorb everybit of that picture because it's my insight to who theses guys are and where they came from and the lives that they live. my views are very much analytical but it is the way i see fashion and life. if it wasn't for this perception i'd buy wrangler instead of watanabe but i dont for the sole fact of attention to detail that junya puts into his garments.

there are many other factors not yet discussed in here and maybe i'll a dress them tomorrow maybe i won't due to the reply's and comments i get or lack of. as it is 1 am and i've been up all day i'll try to punctuate properly tomorrow.

++kthxbuhhy++

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dont forget the swagger part of the equation

i remember being in seattle once, and i remeber this guy walked by who i thought was homeless just based on what he was wearing... lots of layers, dark greens, browns... camo and pockets, shaved head

i did a double take though, because it certainly didnt look like dude was dressed the way i usually see homeless dressed

i just thought, shiiiiit, that guys got fuckin style

We have steezy homeless people, no joke. They are all milspecked out.

San Fran has some high class homeless too.

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runways were made to look more spectacular than the people watching it.

i'd see it as not as a pure example to follow, but rather a walking product line - you don't go to a single store and pick out an entire outfit.

bottom line for me would have to be blending in with whats normality on the streets, but standing out in the most understated of ways. more respect when you see "generic" things look great on certain people, rather then out of this world pieces that just look...well, out of this world.

its about making practicality look good basically.

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hahaha @ rajio.

If only we were B.A.L.L.A.-in like you.

I agree with mellow. Most of the how you pull an outfit off is the steez/swagger/whatever. If you can rock it, you can rock it. If you can't.. well, that's what happens to most "fashion disasters".

But talking about practicality, I don't think clothing has to be in parallel to how you live your life. For me, I just view it as a way to express myself visually, as well as for the aesthetic value of "making myself look good". I get shit all the time from friends who wonder why would anyone spend so much on something that provides little more "practical" value than shirt, jeans, and sneakers, but each person expresses themselves in different ways, I just like being able to project an image about myself just by looking at me.

/procrastination

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the thing about high fashion is, it shouldn't be treated and worn as fashion. I think a reason why a lot of people seem uncomfortable in high end or avant garde garments is there may be some kind of distinct detachedness between the wearer and the garment when he puts it on, he feels as if it is something which is not naturally him..this might operate on a more subconscious level, or maybe i'm overanalyzing it. I think clothes, regardless of label or price point, should not be fussy or overthought when putting it on. Thom Browne put it best when he said a man should never look like he spent more than 5 minutes getting dressed.

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the thing about high fashion is, it shouldn't be treated and worn as fashion. I think a reason why a lot of people seem uncomfortable in high end or avant garde garments is there may be some kind of distinct detachedness between the wearer and the garment when he puts it on, he feels as if it is something which is not naturally him..this might operate on a more subconscious level, or maybe i'm overanalyzing it. I think clothes, regardless of label or price point, should not be fussy or overthought when putting it on. Thom Browne put it best when he said a man should never look like he spent more than 5 minutes getting dressed.

this much is true, i think besides the obvious swagger element there is a divide between those who understand the aesthetic and brands their wearing as opposed to those who simply buy what brands/looks are hot right now. Some members don't really have their own inspiration or sense of self and still spend huge sums in order to give off the appearance that they understand fashion. (faking the funk in other words)

to tie this in back to my original points, i find it somewhat refreshing that finally things are getting back to praising those with swagger and individual style instead of simply praising those with the most expensive wardrobes (see talented mr.hedior, who improved when he stopped trying to floss so hard with every fit).

That being said I think sometimes being on sufu / SZ whatever for extended amounts of time definetly warps your sense of reality. For the amounts that some people spend i still think that many of the fits look costume-y because their swagger or lifestyle hasn't caught up to their wardrobe yet.

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weird but i think i'm the opposite of most people. i own a design firm in nyc so I can wear pretty much anything to work and lots of clients have complimented me on some of my wilder shit, i.e., silver-plasticy raf blazers and such.

conversely, i'm married with kids and moved to the burbs so i get some very odd looks for the stuff i wear around town.

i've started to really focus on basics and avoid designer impulse buys on items i might wear once if ever. Every time i but some weird, too-avant shit i wind up posting it on ebay. maybe i'm just getting old and more practical.

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the thing about high fashion is, it shouldn't be treated and worn as fashion. I think a reason why a lot of people seem uncomfortable in high end or avant garde garments is there may be some kind of distinct detachedness between the wearer and the garment when he puts it on, he feels as if it is something which is not naturally him..this might operate on a more subconscious level, or maybe i'm overanalyzing it. I think clothes, regardless of label or price point, should not be fussy or overthought when putting it on. Thom Browne put it best when he said a man should never look like he spent more than 5 minutes getting dressed.

i like this train of thought. i always describe it as "costume fashion". if you're to wear the 3 jacket cdg outfit literally it is a total costume. same for overly styled pieces, the faux tie uniform experiment or 1st collection KVA come to mind. back to cdg with the layeres collection or galliano or whatever - fashion houses create these narratives to give a sense of continuity to a range of clothing, but the individual pieces are just clothes. they've got to be integrated into a personal style or else you're in dior homme hell. i guess at this point it's painfully clear that when people wear the whole hedi slimane getup it's a really expensively hamfisted reference to this scene in london that you certainly aren't part of.

i really love the lanvin collections because lots of the items are neutral but still cool and not demanding you buy pieces to go together. one of my fav labels is cdg evergreen for these same reasons.

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very well put, josephr. I am all for individual style and appreciation of designer's work, but there's got to be some kind of unofficial line where once it's crossed, one is simply being a fashion victim rather than understanding and appropriating a designer's work into one's personality, philosophy and world view. Usually this line is crossed when you see things like what you mentioned, the 3 layer CdG get up, all out Slimane (and I don't mean the suits), etc.

Lanvin is walking a very thin line...i don't own much, just a cotton suit and a pair of sneakers, but i find that it is starting to cater to the commercial/fashion victim crowd with its recent collections. I enjoyed it for its fine quality and laid back tailoring at first, but with recent shows and what i've seen of the current collection it's going a bit in the way of Hedi Slimane's Dior Homme (esp. the latter half). What i mean by this is, you look at what Tim Blanks said about the latest runway show:

"Ossendrijver talked about wanting to convey the idea of boys growing up too fast, so that their clothes were always too big or too small. (Raf Simons was also inspired by such moments of transition—do you think these mythical “boys” have any sense of the sway they hold over the vanguard of men’s fashion?)"

now of course fashion gets its inspiration from reality and excels because it manages to put a fantastical, somewhat surreal spin on it. But grown men who will be buying this stuff, much like those who adopt Hedi's London look without being a part of the culture, seem to be missing the point because they have made themselves into an audience for the clothes who aren't displaying much integrity in the way of personal style, and likewise designers react by continuing to produce stuff that is dictated by the general fashion consuming public, most of whom might be mostly into it for the sake of it being haute. It's what happened to Kris Van Assche, Hedi Slimane at Dior after 2005 (the S/S collection was a turning point), and it's what's happening at Lanvin now (notice how each passing collection has more and more items that look like streetwear). It's hard to say whether it's the chicken or the egg, i think it's a two way dialogue that can be quite complex. Which is why I respect Yohji Yamamoto because he seems to be beyond any trends, opinions or criticisms, and has continued to push his vision of what he believes is the ideal male image. And I think at the end of the day, from a design/artistry point of view, it's what designers should do: stick to their guns.

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i like this train of thought. i always describe it as "costume fashion". if you're to wear the 3 jacket cdg outfit literally it is a total costume. same for overly styled pieces, the faux tie uniform experiment or 1st collection KVA come to mind. back to cdg with the layeres collection or galliano or whatever - fashion houses create these narratives to give a sense of continuity to a range of clothing, but the individual pieces are just clothes. they've got to be integrated into a personal style or else you're in dior homme hell. i guess at this point it's painfully clear that when people wear the whole hedi slimane getup it's a really expensively hamfisted reference to this scene in london that you certainly aren't part of.

i really love the lanvin collections because lots of the items are neutral but still cool and not demanding you buy pieces to go together. one of my fav labels is cdg evergreen for these same reasons.

What he said.

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to tie this in back to my original points, i find it somewhat refreshing that finally things are getting back to praising those with swagger and individual style instead of simply praising those with the most expensive wardrobes (see talented mr.hedior, who improved when he stopped trying to floss so hard with every fit).

although i can see where your comming from i disagree. i think although our waywt is stacked with more best/inspirational/creative posters more than ever we however are still heavily out numbered by the fakes/wannabe's who can never seem to portray a sense of self as clearly as the ones they rip off. and these posters are given reputation as if its acceptable. a clear example is the infamous eb947500ba (however you spell it). yes it is a tired arguement but there is truthto it that there is no swagger to him yet his reputation (as a sense of validation) is among that of authentic posters. maybe its not you or me that reps these people but the fact is that people are still accepting these members as if they are among the authentic when really they are just posers.

now of course fashion gets its inspiration from reality and excels because it manages to put a fantastical, somewhat surreal spin on it. But grown men who will be buying this stuff, much like those who adopt Hedi's London look without being a part of the culture, seem to be missing the point because they have made themselves into an audience for the clothes who aren't displaying much integrity in the way of personal style

i very much agree with this that there should be a cohesiveness to the wearer and the enviroment that he or she lives in. that is sometimes where i find that models aren't necessarly the right ones to portray the runway look. i mean yes i would love to have a slim figure and wear Dior, and CDG the way the models do but when i see the runway pictures the models never convey the message of what the collection is all about. there emotionless canvas to portray art through. now i'm not saying theres anything wrong in general but sometimes i would like to see authentic models, the kind of people the designers are trying to portray. as idealogical as it sounds i would like to see that. real fucking people wearing real fucking clothing and not the pretentious collectors bullshit that i see in alot of people.

Which is why I respect Yohji Yamamoto because he seems to be beyond any trends, opinions or criticisms, and has continued to push his vision of what he believes is the ideal male image. And I think at the end of the day, from a design/artistry point of view, it's what designers should do: stick to their guns.

this is also why i admire Yohji Yamamoto because he is a man that can walk to his own beat. and hell there is alot of respect for a man who is willing to go against the odds and in my eyes he wins every time :D.

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An outfit in a runway show is like a piece of art in a gallery. The price of it changes nothing -- if it doesn't work in yr individual lifestyle, then it's a huge flop. An Andy Warhol in some old, rich geezer's mansion? Delacroix's Liberty Leading The People (or any romantic period painting) in a design firm's minimalistic waiting room? I don't think so.

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