Ostensibly, I am critical of the fashion industry. There are quite a few glaring problems when it comes to representation of culture and women and their bodies.
Fashion plays a huge role in influencing how people relate to their appearance. Models, and the clothes they wear, often perpetuate the idea of the ideal body being thin, white, and wealthy.
The wealthy part is what really gets to me, because obviously everyone has to engage with fashion on some level. It's a never ending cycle. We all have to wear clothes every day, and some days we have to buy new clothes to replace the clothes we've worn out, obviously.
Even if we make our own clothes, the chances are we will be buying fabrics designed with the latest trends in mind.
I like to think because we don't have any choice but to engage that the floor is open to almost anyone to interpret clothing in ways that are more representative, but it doesn't seem as if it's easy to get a place in the fashion industry if you're not already wealthy.
Big name labels are run by people who get paid a huge amount of money to design clothes for people who have a lot of money to spend on the latest styles. The clothes we buy are watered down versions of the clothes sold off runways in Paris and Milan.
So it looks as if you have to start out appealing to what the upper echelons of society want in order to have mass influence on what everyone else wants, and if you're not white and wealthy and you want to design clothing that speaks to you and your life experience, then you are not necessarily going to be speaking to a moneyed elite.
Personally, I can't even begin to imagine spending two months' worth of rent on a single shirt, no matter how nice it might be, and I am sure it would be very nice. But nice or not, I know very few people who can relate to spending a sum that totals half their wages on a pair of underpants.
Sometimes, however, I find myself mindlessly scrolling online and wondering where all these regular people find their clothes and why they look so nice. Then I remember there are people out there who actually buy new clothes, and who are prepared to spend more than $20 on a single item. And there is nothing wrong with that.
I'm just stingy and picky, a less than ideal combination. It is the exclusivity of fashion that grinds my gears. I don't have any problem with people wearing whatever they want. Whether I think it looks uncomfortable or entirely impractical doesn't matter.
I very much appreciate that my friends hardly ever wince at my penchant for all things oversized and ugly, and my more unpleasant colour combinations. Fashion is an art form, and I do believe it should be taken very seriously, but also viewed very critically.
The majority of people, who are forced to participate in the fashion industry by virtue of needing clothing, have their needs ignored even though it makes no sense.
I would have thought you could make more money by making clothes people are happy to spend money on, rather than clothes very few people feel comfortable in and resent buying.
Clothing is a very important social marker, and fashion absolutely visibly stratifies class, and this is something that needs to be more openly addressed.
Millie Lovelock is a Dunedin student.
