- “It berates the narcissistic cult of celebrity that places individualism above community…. It challenges a consumerist understanding of value, where low price and ephemeral modishness trump quality and pleasure.”
- “Fashion does not define. It is instead a term that demands definition”
In Christopher Breward’s Foreword, the idea of the fashion industry in absolute decline is examined. The most pivotal points stated in this excerpt can be rephrased into the following. Breward examines the influence of pop culture and the celebrity as assimilating the consumer into conforming to trends. This highlights the influence of a specific group over the market and over what consumers value. This shapes consumer value into buying into garments and items that are great for a short amount of time. Items which devalue the practice of craft and true quality. Later in the passage Breward goes further into how fashion is shaped in this new lense that is the twenty first century. Further exploring how fashion is simply without a shape. Rather fashion is not something which defines anything it is itself a term which demands a definition. This furthers the evolving industry and the way in which the Industry is being shaped by the evolving consumer. I second both of these statements as I believe that although the fashion industry is in decline there is a complexity in its nature. Fashion is in fact a term that needs definition however the consumer and the ever changing forces that influence them are ultimately the things which create such a definition for fashion.
