Fancy dress, every day, for everybody
Last month, during London Fashion Week, I took my six-year-old daughter with me to Gareth Pugh's show as a treat. Pugh is one of the more ballyhooed YBDs (Young British Designers), having graduated only three years ago from Central St Martins, received a Topshop-sponsored New Generation grant from the British Fashion Council and garnered lots of attention last season for making clothes that looked like the scene in The Incredibles where Mr Incredible tries to escape the bad guy's clutches and gets caught in a trap of inflatable plastic balls.
Not only that but Pugh worked as an intern for Los Angeles designer Rick Owens, famous for his inventive way with soft leather, and now Owens says he's going to back Pugh, which makes young Gareth one of the few YBDs with any support network.
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That doesn't mean much to my daughter but she loves The Incredibles and I thought she might get a kick out of the show.
Then the first "model" came out. I say "model" because it was impossible to tell who was under the giant black and white checkerboard polo-neck dress and leather head-and-body stocking. There were two pinpricks in the mask for whomever to see through and two pinpricks for the nostrils but otherwise: S&M-ville. This was followed by a puffa-shrug of silver-and-black checks over a black chainmail dress over another full-body leather suit, complete with horse's tail jutting upward from crown. Later there was a Lucite-look, very pointy arm pincer-thing.
"She's going to have nightmares," the women next to me said disapprovingly, nodding down at Allegra, who was seated on the floor.
I did feel a little concerned. As the show ended and we got up to leave, however, my daughter turned to me, face alight. "Mommy," she asked, "will you get me one of those knight's costumes?"
As a friend said when I told this story last week, it's all in how you see it.
What the six-year-old saw, as opposed to the grown-up (who perhaps had issues of her own), was the reality of fashion. There's a reason the history of fashion is also called the history of costume: clothes are simply how we dress ourselves everyday to telegraph our character to the world. This truth comes barrelling through in Alicia Drake's new book, The Beautiful Fall, about Yves Saint Laurent and Karl Lagerfeld in 1970s Paris. Drake describes in great detail the illustrator Antonio Lopez and his friend, art director Juan Ramos, getting dressed up every day during their summer holidays on the French Riviera in "wide-legged herringbone trousers, long-sleeved shirts and fitted waistcoats . . . adding spotted silk bow ties [and] diamante clips". The point being that they "dressed the Gatsby part but used their Latino skin and features to skewer the Waspy image", and, thus, assert their position in the world.
Admittedly, they were fashion people, so you could expect them to take the costuming part of the job more literally than most but, generally, I don't believe they're any different to the rest of us getting dressed every morning.
I live in Camden, north London. Every time I leave the supermarket I see groups of teenagers walking by wearing spikes, fuchsia hair, black lips and assorted studded dog collars. Next to them, my neighbours: the Academic, all rumpled brown suits and plaid shirts; and the Great American Writer (at least in his mind), faded jeans and faded snap-pocket denim shirt. Tell me those aren't costumes meant to communicate a role.
This keeps getting driven home, not least by the story below this column. Meanwhile, recently my friend Roberto, who is one half of a design team called Trash Couture, presented me with a photograph he and his partner Ann had taken for a recent collection: five women sitting in a circle under leafy trees, wearing artfully draped and faded tulle and lace gowns dripping pearls and gems, arms raised to the heavens. "They're our fertility goddesses," he said, laughing, (he thinks my having three children is a bizarrely fertile thing to do). The women certainly look like goddesses in that woodland setting but here's the thing: on their own, at a black-tie party, they also would have looked simply elegant. In a staged photo they looked like they were dressed for the stage; at a charity auction they would have looked dressed to bid. Either way, they were goddess-like but in one place as text, while in the other as subtext.
Later I was talking to my friend Steve, who works at a bank, and he mentioned that when he comes home from work everyday he takes off his suit and puts on jeans and a T-shirt.
"Oh, I do that," I said. "I have to, to stop the baby wiping his runny nose all over my clothes and making my dry cleaning bill gigantic."
Steve gave me a weird look. "No," he said, "I just don't feel comfortable in my suit. It's something I have to put on to become this office person."
Next Tuesday is Halloween. I didn't buy my daughter "one of those knight's costumes" - Averyl Oates, the buying director at Harvey Nichols wanted them all for her window display - so Allegra has decided to be a vampire. Her little sister is going as a witch and her brother a tiger. Her mother, who will not have time to change her clothes after work in spite of her need to be protected from the baby and his nose, is going in black Pierre Cardin dress, white undershirt and black ankle boots, as a fashion editor.
I expect everyone will recognise the costume.
向世界穿出个性
6
岁女孩眼中的“时装”
在上月的伦敦时装周(London Fashion Week)期间，我特意带着6岁的女儿去看加雷思?皮尤(Gareth Pugh)的时装秀。皮尤是名头较大的YBD（Young British Designers “英国年轻设计师”）中的一员，三年前才从中央圣马丁艺术设计学院(Central St Martins)毕业，拿到了一个由英国时装协会(British Fashion Council)颁发、由Topshop品牌赞助的“新生代”(New Generation)奖。由于在上季设计了看起来像《超人总动员》(The Incredibles)道具似的服装，他得到了很多人的关注。在《超人总动员》里，“超能先生”试图逃脱坏人的控制、落入了一个充气塑料球堆成的陷阱。
还不止这些，皮尤还曾在洛杉矶设计师里克?欧文斯(Rick Owens)手下实习。欧文斯以对软皮革的创造性运用而著称，现在他表示，有意支持皮尤，这位年轻的“圆桌骑士”由此成了为数不多有人支持的“英国年轻设计师”之一。
这对我女儿来说没什么意义，但她很喜欢《超人总动员》，我以为她也许会喜欢看这场服装秀。
随后，第一个“模特”出场了。我之所以加上引号，是因为根本不可能看出是谁藏身在巨大的国际象棋棋盘翻领长衫和从头到脚的皮长袜中。面具上有两个小孔，供里面的人往外看，鼻孔的位置有两个小孔，但其它方面就是S&M-ville（“施虐和受虐式的”）。随后，是一格一格膨胀起来的银黑色外套、下面一条金属盔甲般的黑色长裙，里面套着另一件全身皮装，最后帽子顶端还探出一些马尾。然后，是某种看起来像合成树脂、非常尖、臂状钳子一样的东西。
我旁边的女士用下巴指了指坐在地板上的阿莱格拉(Allegra，我女儿)，不赞成地说道：“她会做噩梦的。”
我的确也觉得有点担心。然而，当时装秀结束，我们起身离开时，我女儿向我转过身、兴高采烈地问道：“妈妈，你能给我买一套那种骑士装吗？”
正如上周我谈到这件事时，一位朋友所说的那样：这完全取决于你如何看待它。
时尚人士的着装风格
与成人（她或许有自己的观点）不同，6岁孩子看到的是时装的本来面目。时装史之所以也叫服装史，有一个原因：服装只是我们每天装扮自己、向世界传递我们个性的一种方式。这个事实在艾丽西亚?德雷克(Alicia Drake)的新书《The Beautiful Fall》中有所探讨。这本书讲述了20世纪70年代巴黎的伊夫?圣?洛朗(Yves Saint Laurent)和卡尔?拉格菲尔德(Karl Lagerfeld)。德雷克非常细致地描述了插图画家安东尼奥?洛佩斯(Antonio Lopez)和他的朋友、艺术总监胡安?拉莫斯(Juan Ramos)，他们夏季假日在法国里维埃拉度假时每天盛装打扮，穿着“阔腿人形裤、长袖衬衫与合体的马甲……加上带圆点的丝制蝴蝶领结，还有镶有人造钻石的胸针”。他要说的是，他们“打扮得像要扮演盖茨比（Gatsby）似的，却用他们拉美人的皮肤和容貌穿插上美国白人的形象，”并且由此确定了他们在全球的位置。
诚然，他们是时尚人士，因此你可以认为，他们比多数人更会把着装作为工作的一部分，但一般而言，我并不认为他们每天早晨起来穿衣服跟我们有什么不同。
我住伦敦北部的卡姆登区，每次离开超市时都能看见成群结队的十几岁的孩子们，她们穿着高跟鞋，头发染成紫红色，涂着黑色唇膏，脖子上还戴着缀满各种装饰钉的狗脖套。在他们身旁，是我的邻居们：都是学院派，穿着皱巴巴的灰色套装和格子花呢衬衫；而伟大的美国作家（至少在他自己是这么以为的）则穿着褪色的牛仔裤和褪色的按扣兜粗斜纹棉布衬衫。你可别告诉我，穿那些衣服不是为了传达某种身份。
时装和身份的关系
这一点不断得到认同，不只是通过本栏目的故事。另外，我的朋友罗伯托（他是一个名为Trash Couture的设计团队的两名成员之一），最近给我看了一张他和他的合作伙伴安娜为一组时装系列拍的照片：5名女性在树叶茂盛的树下坐成一圈，穿着故意弄皱和褪色的薄纱，以及镶嵌着珍珠和珠宝的蕾丝长袍，双臂举向天空。
“这是我们的丰收女神，”他笑着说道（他认为我有三个孩子，是件得有极强繁殖能力才能做到的事）。这些女子置身于森林布景中，看上去的确像女神，但事实是：如果在一个半正式派对上，她们看上去也会非常优雅。在一张舞台照上，她们看上去就像为了舞台而着装；在一场慈善拍卖会上，她们穿得就像要竞拍一样。随便从哪个角度说，她们都像是女神，但在这里是“正文”，而在那里则是“潜台词”。
后来，我跟在银行工作的朋友史蒂夫聊天，他谈到，他每天下班回到家，就会脱下西服，换上牛仔裤和T恤。
“哦，我也这样，”我说道。“我必须换衣服，要不孩子会把他流个不停的鼻涕蹭我一身，那样我们的干洗费用就太高了。”
史蒂夫用奇怪的眼神看着我。“不，”他说道。“我只是觉得穿着西装不舒服。我穿它是被迫的，只是为了看起来像个在办公室上班的人。”
万圣节的时候，我没有给我女儿买“一件那样的骑士装”――Harvey Nichols百货公司的采购主管阿弗里尔?奥茨(Averyl Oates)要把它们全买下用于橱窗展示了――因此，阿莱格拉决定扮成吸血鬼。她的小妹妹扮成巫婆，而她的弟弟则扮成老虎。作为她的母亲，我虽然不想受婴儿鼻涕的涂炭，但却没有换衣服的时间。作为一名时尚编辑，我要穿件黑色皮尔?卡丹女装、白色汗衫和黑色的及踝短靴。
我希望这身装束能得到所有人的认可。
