image: Luna magazine, July 2003.
Fast Fashion or Slow Style? Most people think this choice is ostensibly, totally dependent on the state of your bank account. If you make $15/hr you should shop at H&M; if you make $1500/hr you should shop at Holts. Is it really this black and white? Rich or poor? Better or worse? Or has the consumer construct lead us to believe that affordability should guide all our consumerist consuming and has thus, carved out a gaping hole in the marketplace for the obeasts (obese beasts) like Walmart, H&M, Zara, and Target to squeeze their fat asses into. The question of affordability is then readily answered, over and over again, when you can walk into H&M and feel like a Queen because you are well aware that there isn’t one item in the entire store that you can’t afford. A.k.a. Field Day.
In my past articles such as The Elegant Hipster, I flesh out the possibility of owning a designer wardrobe by not adhering to standard notions about affordability. Our closets are busting at the seams; girls shop for a new outfit every weekend; consignment stores have become our new best friend as they gladly try to scrounge up a few dollars for last season’s Zara fuchsia pink blazer we just dumped on them; bi-weekly trend reports on blogs and online shopping sites (mytheresa.com does a number on us with their Tuesday/Thursday new shipments) tell us last week’s red python has nothing on this week’s green jersey, etc., etc.
So we rush off to whatever store it is that fits our budget and participate in the grand ingestion of goods because there’s a whole infrastructure in place to guide us through purchasing, layaway, paying our VISAs, re-selling, refuelling for next week’s buy and somewhere in between actually using the stuff we purchase. I just whizzed through Style.com’s Top Ten Spring Must-have Accessories and could already envision the dispersion of flame-burning stilettos and Mondrian-esque clutches at my local H&M, serving up the look of Prada and Celine to those who can’t afford the real thing – or can they?
image: Prada flame shoes and Celine clutch; both from SS2012
H&M brought Versace to the poor, Lanvin to the sick and Cavalli to the needy – all under the guise of affordability. But how much longer can this Robin Hood act really go on? The $15/hr is spending just as much as the $1500/hr, and truthfully, getting less bang for their buck. Has anything you’ve purchased at H&M really lasted you a lifetime? Of course not. It’s not supposed to. The whole idea is to encourage rampant spending so you can be sure to blow $1500 every 2-3 months and getting 11 t-shirts, 7 pants, 4 dresses, 2 coats and a goofy motorcycle vest for your hard-earned money. And then do it all again next season. To most people this seems like a deal of the century.
If you think this is only happening in the fashion industry, you are sorrily mistaken. Have you seen the real estate fare going up these days? I don’t know who the H&M of developers is but I’m sure they are out there coming to a sales centre near you. I mean who can afford a house these days? Who can afford Gucci? Instead we comfortably settle for a 400 sq ft cubby hole with linoleum countertops and poorly placed floor beams; and 40 dollar suits.
Which makes me think a rather disturbing yet altogether inspiring thought:
If only houses existed, and only 4,000 dollar suits were made what kind of world would we be living in?
It would no longer be a question of affordability but of adapting to what’s available. Opulent communism – what’s so bad about a world in which we can all wear Versace?
image: Abbey Lee Kershaw in Versace Spring 2011 ad campaign.
OK, OK, I am admittedly getting a little too utopian for even my liking but there is something to be said of the availability of quality. If supply and demand is actually a thing then demanding quality goods should thus induce the increased supply of said goods. However, the more Chanel bags we demand, the higher the price goes up, the longer the waiting lists, and the better Zara looks as an alternative. The whole system is twisted. On the bright side, this can’t go on forever or at least I hope it doesn’t. Our closets aren’t the only thing busting at the seams – resources, populations, waste – I’m no BBC junkie but you’d be hard pressed to say this has nothing to do with the advent of fast fashion, however tenuous this correlation may appear.
It seems to me that a return to opulence is becoming a very attractive alternative.
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