As detailed in Chapter 4 V&R, Adam Smith argues that one is moral if in symmetry with the spectator. Who is the spectator, how many are watching, how partial or impartial they are, and do they agree with one another are all delicious questions first raised by any moral analysis using Smith’s ideas. The basic…
Over the last few months in a number of posts I have questioned the assumption of so many fashion pages that there is something pernicious about nationalism. There is, of course, such a thing as venomous nationalism but there is no fundamental law that nation and malice are twins. I simply have no idea…
Well, well. How nice is this? The Met is going to take up the themes of V&R this year in its annual meditation on fashion. The topic is the place of Catholicism in the lives of so many fashion designers (https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/08/style/met-museum-costume-institute-catholicism.html). I shall certainly go and give you some of my thoughts here.
H&M are not an especially moral company and do not make the list of The Best Dressed Award that I have going. They have a new video ad that reaches back to Evelyn Waugh’s Brideshead Revisited. The video is a re-enactment of Charles driving with Sebastien to Brideshead for the first time. I am a…
Readers know that the 3rd Earl of Shaftesbury is a firm favourite of mine. He’d be delighted to see the 12th Earl of Shaftesbury deferring to, and feeling obligated by, the family home and its beauty: http://www.stgileshouse.com/blog/short-film-featuring-the-earl-of-shaftesbury
Going up for auction but a very fun thought: Might a day come when a pope would keep such a car and zip around Rome putting a smile of people’s faces? More here: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/11/15/pope-francis-given-lamborghini-sports-car-plans-auction-charity/
This is some news: researchers at Cambridge have printed electrical circuits directly onto sustainable fabric (http://www.cam.ac.uk/research/news/fully-integrated-circuits-printed-directly-onto-fabric). If we don’t literally become cyborgs, looks like we’ll be wearing fabrics soon that’ll make us rather like cyborgs on the outside. Clothes linked directly to the internet? Your Pinterest moving across your jumper? David Hume is thrilled.
Paris is currently celebrating the vitrines of Leïla Menchari of Hermès (http://www.anothermag.com/fashion-beauty/10351/the-fascinating-woman-behind-hermes-window-displays). Pierre-Alexis Dumas, artistic director of Hermès, describes each window as a little theatre in which each piece plays its role perfectly. Huizinga approves.
The best line in a recent article on Dolce & Gabbana’s couture business: “After dinner, back at Palermo’s Villa Igiea hotel, which had been reserved for those clients who were not staying on yachts…” (https://www.wsj.com/articles/behind-the-scenes-at-dolce-gabbanas-couture-club-for-top-clients-1506527428: annoyingly, The Wall Street Journal puts articles behind a paywall. Sorry). Dolce & Gabbana is now exclusively a couture…
A good article on Van Noten (https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/16/t-magazine/dries-van-noten.html) dwells on two things Shaftesbury and Scheler would enjoy: gardens and heritage. In light of Shaftesbury, in a few blog posts I explored the relationship between flowers and fashion. According to Hanya Yanagihara, Van Noten’s use of colour is derived from his fascination with flowers and their…