V&R Chapter 1 discusses Hume’s theory of business. Boiling things down: it is not money that makes the world go around but beauty. The economy’s dynamism is a function of fantasies about luxury. Luxuries are refinements of the arts and sciences and those who want to afford them must themselves become combinations of the arts…
A celebration of Scheler’s estate: https://www.businessoffashion.com/articles/news-bites/architectural-digest-indias-craftsmanship-issue?utm_source=Subscribers&utm_campaign=1b627e3e8e-friday-nl&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_d2191372b3-1b627e3e8e-417297929
Anyone who follows the fashion pages knows that since Brexit it has become axiomatic that fashion is global and that means fashion is on the side of the angels. For this axiom fully on display, see: https://i-d.vice.com/en_uk/article/wjjjay/an-interview-with-maria-grazia-chiuri-dior. Of course, I have seen no fashion page defending this idea philosophically. In an earlier post, I point…
A most interesting article about pre-historic Britons (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/2017/08/09/ancient-britons-ate-dead-carved-mysterious-markings-bones/). Evidence has been found that about 15,000 years ago early Britons ate their dead but then ritually marked the bones. Scarring the bones, researchers speculate, may have been a way to memorialize the dead and even perhaps tell the story of their lives. It is a strange…
Brunello Cucinelli tops the list for Best Dressed Company Award. Regular readers know this is my on-going effort to list those companies which do best and worst on ethical business practice in the fashion industry. The list is incomplete, of course, but inspired mostly by whether a company models itself on the estate, Scheler’s theory…
A new memoir of Andy Warhol is out written by Natasha Fraser-Cavassoni (http://www.rollingstone.com/culture/features/andy-warhol-natasha-fraser-cavassoni-memoir-captures-catholic-side-w495433). Fraser-Cavassoni was with Warhol in his last years and her memoir stresses the role Catholicism played in his life and art. I will be reading this and saying more. For now, merely passing on the good news! Update: finally got a…
One year ago today V&R went active as a website with the monograph posted! Pictures in the text and blog followed just a few days later and since then V&R has been getting about 300 visitors a month. I know that is not a huge number remotely by internet standards but for a website about…
Ford will never be a model of Scheler’s estate but it is nice to learn that the car company has a bespoke arm. In this video, Jay Leno gives a great sense of the bespoke service: you just need to watch from the start and his discussion goes till about 8 minutes (one could watch…
Target does $70 billion US in sales annually. It is a massive company and though sales are down it isn’t going anywhere. Target is the inverse of Scheler’s estate and we must assume that much of its clothing is made in less than ideal conditions. However, the company is being forced to respond to other…
*Readers might recall that I organize discussions at Loyola around topics in CST. V&R Chapters 2 & 3 rely on papal moral reflection to examine the fashion industry. For those close to Loyola who wish to join the autumn discussion, here is the information. Hope some local readers can make it. Committee on Catholic…