The Fashion B-Side

The B-Side

Sara Fang

Fashion and art are equally universal, unavoidable and vital. Whether we claim not to give our style any thought or spend hours crafting outfits, we all have a relationship to fashion. Maybe you leaf through a thrift store’s offerings or you endure the inevitable stab wounds of a sewing machine in an attempt to construct an image that expresses some part of you. Fashion is art, and it follows that the two intersect with and influence each other. In this B-Side, 13 arts writers investigate questions ranging from why luxury brands are adopting influencers to how music genre subcultures shape and are influenced by the fashions surrounding them. Many bring personal experiences — inhabiting other personalities using costumes, breaking free from the suppression of school uniforms, finding connection among strangers by wearing merch — to prove the profound impacts clothing has. Fashion is how we tell people about ourselves. It can be a political statement, a confirmation of one’s permission to take up space or. proof of a future connection before words are spoken. Like art, it is a language — one of individualism, visibility, politics, sexuality and beauty — that our writers put to words.

Senior Arts Editor Erin Evans