Style, Fashion and Individuality

I started this blog to share ideas with interesting people; it's allowed me to communicate in different ways with those that I already feel close to while simultaneously enabling me to engage with new people. And so it was a couple of days ago when, due to the intervention of the amazing randomness of life that I ended up in an awesome conversation in a pub...talking about style, and individuality, and whether it and fashion are one and the same. And I felt inspired to finish this post.

First though, I'm gonna step back for one mo to give the tiniest of personal perspectives. At some point relatively recently in my life, walls started tumbling down and I suddenly felt the true vastness of possibility - it wasn't just hope, it was a knowledge that I could achieve whatever I wanted to because really anything is possible as long as one devotes their energy to it, gives it a chance. It was this
shift in perception. And it was huge.

I think that was one of the reasons that I changed how I look. But I've remained curious. Why did I, do I, choose to wear the things my wardrobe is now, more and more, populated with. I tend to wear slightly more formal stuff because it suits me better. Hmmm.

So there I was changing how I looked. It was strange because style and fashion had previously felt foreign; it was like a strange world with strange ruies about white shoes going with white belts, but careful about the black socks!! It was a world that I perceived, observed - but didn't ever feel part of. But I suddenly wanted it for me. I wanted to look good. I was, am, proud of myself - proud of how far I have come and of the person I am gradually becoming, despite my missteps along the way. And when I wear certain things I feel smart, and sharp. I look good. And I can't deny that other people probably get a different impression off of me because of that. I wonder how much is psychological - and you know what, maybe just for that effect alone the reason is validated?

The thing is, I don't want to be doing this for other people. And largely I don't think generally people entirely do. But I've often pondered whether there it's like a finely weighted analogue market scale where we do it partially for us, but, you know what: we all care what other people think. Maybe in reality it's a case of there is caring, and caring too much? I reckon the fact we consider it simply comes from the fact we are social beings.

Do we wear things to illicit a particular response from other people? If style is anything I feel It's merely another extension of oneself. There is a certain pride that comes from knowing that you look good; that pride is like choosing to stay healthy...it's caring for yourself and knowing you do so - and part of that has got to be in the way you look - caring about your appearance. I never really understood accessories, and then one day a friend asked me what I wanted for my 21st birthday and I said a watch. From that moment it arrived and I first placed it on my wrist though, I finally had understood. It's being able to express yourself. I think style is a form of self-expression; an expression of who you are.

But then there is a divide between our own view of our ourselves and that which others percieve of us. Which one, if either, is the mask? I guess I was thinking of a situation where you meet someone - maybe someone you like. And then it's only later that you realise what you saw, the vision of them that you had, wasn't quite right - it's not accurate. It was like you were presented with a mask, and it dawns that someone is not what you thought, not who you thought. But is that your innaccurate impression or them actually acting, being different? Maybe clothes are the unfortunate bystander tricked into a role as enabler - we present the ideal of ourselves, the slickened version with fancy hair. And yet the gap between that that and the every day reality - it's large. What about people being straight forward, straight talking.

I guess for an individual it does become a question of the walls, if any, that they construct and the effort entertained to maintain them. Necessary or worth it: who are we doing it for? I think maybe real style is when we strive to be the best we can at all times, we don't make exceptions just because we're not out to impress.

But then there is fashion. The underlying background influence which molds our expectations of what looking good means, what good clothes are? People say that having your own style is important - but is the assertion of ourselves to be always formed within the confines of the framework of fashion. When would that turn to conformism. It's like the fresh water river meeting the salty sea: individuality meets crowd mentality?

So maybe in fact fashion, when you take away the hype and commercialism that seems so pervasive in our society, is art. It's like any music - it's is driven by the same intrigue and subtlety that pervades us when we listen over and over to that new piece of music; I think it's engaging on a very similar level.

And maybe therefore style isn't a discrete quantative property of a person that can be compared. Maybe it's somewhat another subscriber to being in the eye of the beholder, and maybe it is very inidividual. Hmmm.