Ok so this is a blog entry I wrote a while ago and had saved to my hard drive (I'm still not sure why I didn't post it at the time? All I can guess is internet connection problems.. Any hoo)
On an unrelated note, I quit working out on the mines in October, have done an awful lot of soul searching, made some more huge mistakes in life, got a new job, re enrolled to study and basically started 'life' again.. But I'll leave all of that for another post.. But yes the times are a changing and to be honest I think it is much needed...
One of the joys of Foxtel is that I often discover programs and films I might not otherwise have come across, as was the case with the film Boys on the Side...
Still not sure why I hadn't heard of this before? Sheer lack of cultured beings in my life may perhaps provide a clue, but onwards I venture 'Boys' had me style swooning over Drew Barrymore’s look and wardrobe. There was something so fabulously nineties about it all, nostalgic and current all at the same time. I’ve been noticing more and more nineties references cropping up in various style blogs and on girls on the street. I love the way fashion has moved into this period where being referential isn’t seen as a negative, but rather just a by product of where we are at in fashion history. Inevitably we are always moving forwards in time, but these references, the way people are playing with clothing is exciting to me.
We are no longer stuck in a framework of trends. There are just too many different options being sent down the runway in any given season and whilst there will always be ‘trends’ and ‘it items’ pushed forward by the mainstream fashion media (they have too the fashion beast is a machine geared towards sales after all) the onset of blogs and the ever changing nature of the internet and how we communicate as a global community allows for a variety of voices, to alter the main stream message.
There has been a lot of debate about the role of style blogs and their authors and what role they play in ‘Fashion’ (with a capital F) and how they fit in regards to more established media e.g. the fashion mags like WWD and Vogue. Rather than look at this as a them vs us argument as some want to pose it, I think both have their place and that it is a positive thing, it allows for a much wider audience.
Blogs and magazines present two very different sides of this thing we call fashion. For me the likes of Vogue, present the edit of the collections presented in any given season, because let’s be honest how many bloggers really do get invited to sit front row? Very few and far between my friends. They present a fantasy, with editorial spreads filmed in the most decadent of locations, with the world’s most beautiful models, the elite photographers and teams of hair stylists, make up artists and racks upon racks, upon racks of clothes straight off the runway. Which all equates to ridiculously beautiful images, where every item is lust worthy and dreamlike, emphasizing beauty rather than reality.
Blogs for the most part present ‘ordinary’ boys n girls (ladies n gents... what ever you like) styled in their own clothes in a relatively natural environment. Obviously there is an element of creation and editing even in these ‘home made’ styled blogs. We never see these girls n guys in a pair of three day old sweats and an oversized t-shirt with tomato sauce stains down the front. (Nor would we want to I believe) But for the most part where magazines like Vogue (which I adore and could not live without by the way) present a fantasy far removed from the average fashion lover, blogs present something far closer to attainable. These bloggers for the most part do not resemble a fresh faced Miranda Kerr or a self styled Abbey Lee Kershaw, but something closer to ‘normal’.
For too long have unreachable heights of beauty and body image have been thrust forward, I believe blogs have the power to change this. I’m not saying that fashion is about to become all about curves, shapes and sizes without boundaries, I think we are far from that utopian ideal, but I do think it presents something outside of the main stream media edit of what defines beauty, fashion and style. Surely this can be nothing other than a good thing? Opening up a discourse that we are yet to fully appreciate for its ability to change stereotypes and ideals, so it always amazes me when I see the mags vs blogs arguments being thrust forward. Any new form of media is going to gain a form of resistance, it’s natural, we are afraid of change, resistant to it, but it is through change that we experience growth. And for some they say we have no true originals in current fashion, that the last wave of originals were those of Rei Kawabuko (? Spelling) and Comme Des Garcons, Margiela, Deemeulester and the Belgian school that appeared en force a few decades ago now. But I beg to differ, referencing time gone before does not remove the ability to be ‘original’. Everything is referential in one way or another, it’s just how well we hide or display these references. Some are buried deep and others are worn quite literally on our sleeves. Both are worthy of our attention. Which brings us in a very round about way to what started me off on this random assimilation of thoughts, the movie; Boys on the Side and more specifically Drew Barrymore’s wardrobe in the film.
Drew Barrymore’s short, blonde curls, plum lipstick and woollen cardigans, metallic pastel nail polish, love heart sunglasses with red frames and black lenses, denim dungarees and white t-shirts, flat shoes and hand cuffs. Reads like a list of what ha been sent down runways in the last few seasons and seen all over the afore mentioned blogs. Not to mention a young Matthew McConaughy in a tight police uniform. (Insert drool here). It’s all so incredibly nineties and for that I love it. I don’t believe in looking back on past fashion deeming it wrong, or unfashionable or worse tacky. It WAS fashionable at the time, as long as you were happy, who cares if in 5, 10, 15 or 50 years time you cringe at a hair style, or eye makeup or a hemline? Really it’s not important. To those who are truly fashion obsessed you might consider my next statement blasphemous but at the end of the day they ARE JUST CLOTHES. It’s the memories you had whilst wearing them that are important. Too often this is forgotten.
So please I beg of you don’t be afraid of being deemed out or wrong. I don’t believe it matters at the end of the day what you are wearing as long as you are wearing a smile. So be brave, make ‘mistakes’ and don’t hide from life behind a veneer of clothing. There is so much else that is important... And now I’m off to go trawl ebay and the local op shops for a knitted green cardigan and see if I can find just the right, wrong shade of plum lipstick, because I’m feeling nostalgic for the decade of my childhood the nineties (I’m a babe of the year 85) when style blogs weren’t even a dirty thought and fashion was about frivolity. When did we all get so serious?
Feel free to disagree with me... I’m all for a healthy debate.
Love C
Reference:
Movie: Boys on the Side (1995) Whoopi Goldberg, Drew Barrymore and Mary Louise Parker.
