Throughout the early 20th century, practically all high fashion originated in Paris and to a lesser extent London.Fashion magazines from other countries sent editors to the Paris fashion shows. Department stores sent buyers to the Paris shows, where they purchased garments to copy (and openly stole the style lines and trim details of others). Both made-to-measure salons and ready-to-wear departments featured the latest Paris trends, adapted to the stores' assumptions about the lifestyles and pocket books of their targeted customers.
At this time in fashion history the division between haute couture and ready-to-wear was not sharply defined. The two separate modes of production were still far from being competitors, and, indeed, they often co-existed in houses where the seamstresses moved freely between made-to-measure and ready-made.
Around the start of the 20th century fashion style magazines began to include photographs and became even more influential than in the future. In cities throughout the world these magazines were greatly sought-after and had a profound effect on public taste. Talented illustrators - among them Paul Iribe, Georges Lepape, Erté, andGeorge Barbier - drew exquisite fashion plates for these publications, which covered the most recent developments in fashion and beauty. Perhaps the most famous of these magazines was La Gazette du bon tonwhich was founded in 1912 by Lucien Vogel and regularly published.d until 1The Second World War created many radical changes in the fashion industry. After the War, Paris's reputation as the global center of fashion began to crumble and off-the-peg and mass-manufactured fashions became increasingly popular. A new youth style emerged in the 1950s, changing the focus of fashion forever. As the installation of central heating became more widespread the age of minimum-care garments began and lighter textiles and, eventually, synthetics, were introduced.
In the West, the traditional divide that had always existed between high society and workers came to be considered simply unjustifiable. In particular, a new young generation wanted to reap the benefits of a booming consumer society. Privilege became less blatantly advertised than in the past and differences were more glossed over. As the ancient European hierarchies were overturned, the external marks of distinction faded with them. By the time the first rockets were launched into space, Europe was more than ready to adopt a quality ready-to-wear garment on American lines, something to occupy the middle ground between off-the-peg and couture. The need was all the more pressing because increases in overheads and raw material costs were beginning to relegate handmade fashion to the sidelines. Meanwhile, rapidly developing new technologies made it easier and easier to manufacture an ever-improving high-quality product.
Faced with the threat of a factory-made fashion-based product, Parisian haute couture mounted its defenses, but to little effect. It could not stop fashion leaking out onto the streets. In these years when the old world was taking its final bow, the changes in fashion were one of the most visible manifestations of the general shake-up in society. Before long, whole categories of women hitherto restricted to inferior substitutes to haute couture would enjoy a greatly enlarged freedom of choice. Dealing in far larger quantities, production cycles were longer than those of couture workshops, which meant that stylists planning their lines for the twice-yearly collections had to try to guess more than a year in advance what their customers would want. A new power was afoot, that of the street, constituting a further threat to the dictatorship of the masters of couture.
In the 2000s, regardless of the notorious Parisian industry which infiltrated the 1900's, the quality and mystique of Italian fashion is unsurprisingly dominant in the twentieth century and Milan well established as the "center" of fashion and design. This is evidenced through the famous "Vogue Italia", being the most internationally acclaimed and most respected magazine in the fashion world. Thus Milan replacing Paris as the most prestigious center. As the future began to seem increasingly bleak, fashion, and indeed the Arts in general, looked to the past for inspiration, arguably more so than in previous decades. Vintage clothing, especially from the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s (the 1980s idea of clashing, electric colours becoming especially popular in mid-late 2007) became extremely popular and fashion designers often sought to emulate bygone styles in their collections. The early 2000s saw a continuation of the minimalist look of the 1990s in high fashion, adopted and incorporated into Giorgio Armani's designs. Later on, designers began to adopt a more colorful, feminine, excessive, and 'anti-modern' look, which is seen in the Dolce & Gabbana brand, in grounding some of their inspiration from Italy's past. Name brands have became of particular importance among young people and many celebrities launched their own lines of clothing. Tighter fit clothing and longer hair became mainstream for many men and women, this sense of modernism and futurism as well as the growing interest of young people was heavily influenced, for instance, by the Calvin Klein and Armani brand names, with their "Jeans" lines targeting young professionals. Therefore, Italian fashion has obviously replaced the French "Couture" influence of old times, however to the envy of some Parisian counterparts in their desperate attempts of claiming international media attention and outlets such as advertising in major magazines, have attempted to overshadow the reality of Italy's success and dominance over French designs and the undercurrent consumer preference to Italian name brands, although in some media outlets it suggests otherwise, as seen through the lack of advertising "balance" between French and Italian brands - the growth of French designers claiming more advertising space, and financial priority in advertising initiatives. Therefore, there is very strong evidence that the fundamental authority in the fashion industry still rests strongly with Europe, particularly Milan and Italian designers - evidenced through the palpable international praise and worshiping of the quality and superiority of Italian tailoring and "Alta Costura" or "high-end" Italian designer products. Regardless of the modern phenomena of the growth of luxury resorts and products being manufactured outside Europe, such as in Asia and the Middle-East, amazingly, Milan is still the dominant center of luxury and prestige in the world, supported by its history and superior quality surpassing the other so-called "centers" labelled by the media which are based mainly on industry and advertising, rather than quality and elegance. These trends suggest that Milanese dominance will continue, as designers from foreign nations look up to and completely depend on Italian and French maestros and masters of the art to teach them. There is an increasing need for excellence and "hyper-luxury", stated in Vogue Australia March 2012, as seen through Italian and French designer prices climbing even higher in spite of the recent economic crisis.
925.
No comments:
Post a Comment