I suspect John Galliano is a very peculiar man. He is also gifted, a true master of imagination and craft. There is a good profile of him and House Margiela in this month’s WSJ Magazine (“Step by Step,” March 2018: behind a paywall, sorry). V&R Chapter 7 explains Kolnai’s defence of the idea of…
Emirates Airlines offers an example backing up the brilliant study of French theorist, Roger Caillois, “Mimicry and Legendary Psychasthenia.” His short but tremendously interesting essay is here: http://www.generation-online.org/p/fpcaillois.htm. Caillois (1913-1978) offers a novel theory for the mimicry common throughout nature. Instead of thinking of it in Darwinian terms, e.g. prey disguising itself like its predator…
Fashion frequently compliments itself for being at the forefront of humanism: about the future, globalist, breaking down barriers, giving voice to all, etc.. Lacan argues the opposite: fashion is about repetition, an aggressive return to earliest human experience (Ecrits, p. 85). The self is a field of conflict, an internal social contest between a fragmented…
Dear readers, I’ll not be posting for the next ten days as I am off to Scotland. I hope to be busy on my return to the US. Meanwhile, wishing you all well, and thanks as always for popping onto V&R and do feel free to leave comments! — Graham
Tengri is an impressive British newcomer to “feel-good fashion,” a business model reflecting the principles of justice found in CST (see the ideas of Pope Benedict [V&R, Chapter 3]). Its website echoes Cucinelli (http://www.tengri.co.uk/), as does the company’s interest in Mongolia (http://www.ethicsoffashion.com/cucinellis-travel-reading/). The video that starts the website concludes with strong Tory emphasis, the company…
For non-American readers the Super Bowl is the culmination of the American football season and a showcase event when companies spend vast sums to have their ads played during the very many breaks in play American football provides. There is fascination with who comes up with the best ads and the most imaginative ad companies…
The New York Times profiles the well-known designer’s decision to refocus his life and business around family and craft. The idea of the article is that the fashion industry is finally waking up to the need to balance work and life (https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/07/fashion/fashion-family-parental-leave-narciso-rodriguez-children.html?rref=collection/sectioncollection/fashion&action=click&contentCollection=fashion®ion=rank&module=package&version=highlights&contentPlacement=1&pgtype=sectionfront). I don’t doubt for a second that in a lot of companies the two…
Handbags sit at the heart of the business of fashion, accounting for about 90% of total revenue at some brands. Why? In a recent post (http://www.ethicsoffashion.com/fashion-marketing-unconscious/) I discussed a Jungian marketing strategy proposed by the dean of the Italian fashion school Polimoda, Danilo Venturi. Venturi argues that the unconscious is populated by archetypes and…
As readers know, this website is a huge fan of Warhol and thinks that pop art raises all manner of extremely interesting questions about the relationship between veneration and refinement, vanity and the sacred. Each year Loyola hosts a lecture these questions so how super it is to learn that the Vatican will host a…
Here is a very interesting, short video lecture by Danilo Venturi of the Italian fashion school Polimoda (https://www.businessoffashion.com/articles/education/polimoda-lecture-three-branding-the-subconscious?utm_source=Subscribers&utm_campaign=68d172373f-what-makes-a-great-fashion-ceo-anne-chapelle-reboo&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_d2191372b3-68d172373f-417297929). Contrary to H&M’s move to tribalism, niche, and fragmentation (see my previous post), Venturi argues that there are eight archetypes lodged in the unconscious to which fashion should appeal. Not only will this make for good…