I appreciate beautiful clothing and, in my own ham-fisted way, I’ve tried to write about clothing here and there on this blog.
I don’t often write about beautiful clothing because, like music and visual art, writing about beautiful clothing doesn’t make a lot of sense to me. Either clothing is beautiful or it is not beautiful. Yes, more can be said, but I’m not convinced additional words add much to the aesthetic experience.
Then, along came Pinterest.
Aha! Here is a purely visual approach for thinking about, appreciating, and “discussing” beautiful clothing.
The challenge for me, when it comes to beautiful clothing, is to distinguish between my aesthetic appreciation of the clothing itself and my sexual desire for the woman wearing it. As a result, I find it easier to celebrate and “pin” higher fashion and more formal office attire, whereas with most casual wear, my aesthetic judgment quickly reduces to “hot or not”. Beautiful and hot can overlap but one is not reducible to the other.
As much as I appreciate beautiful clothing, I’m not terribly interested in fashion, which involves a dimension and expression of solidarity, wherein one celebrates a certain kind of clothing to earn or illustrate membership in a particular group. In the most extreme cases, people who are into fashion can sometimes appreciate and celebrate truly hideous clothing. When they get it right, a huge swath of people end up dressing beautifully.
How do you appreciate clothing?
Are you on Pinterest? Have you learned anything about yourself from it yet?
Posted on March 7, 2012
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