When You Start To Look Deeper : The One In Fashion

I've probably written and rewritten this introduction at least a dozen times in my head. I've written versions of it half a dozen times, in snippets, in emails, text messages, as comments on early planning documents within The Attic’s shared folder.

I've written countless artist statements, collection manifestos, letters of intent... I don't think I've struggled with half of those as much as I have with this. I think I always knew what I wanted out of fashion at any given point, or more precisely, out of any given assignment at any given point. Perhaps therein lies the struggle; fashion for me has always gone hand in hand with academics, and perhaps I need both to survive. But it was, or has been, or is? the love of my life after all, so shouldn't I know what I want from it no matter the context?

Life, and love definitely, might never be as simple as I'd like. When I graduated from university, with a degree in fashion, mind you, I honestly wasn't sure what I wanted anymore. I think because I grew up with such a superficial understanding of fashion, that an education full of possibilities suddenly became very daunting. In a world where everybody’s a this-slash-that-slash-something, where am I supposed to start? I mean, I get it, I've never wanted to be a single thing in my entire life.

So I'm grateful, in the end, for such a varied education, because most importantly, I learned that fashion is not a single thing either. Every single day, it refuses to conform, to decide. And like a newlywed couple moving into their first home together, this is the part where my love and I get comfortable.

There's a beauty in superficiality, but things get so much more interesting when you start to look deeper. To quote the inimitable Coco Chanel, “fashion is in the sky, in the street, fashion has to do with ideas, the way we live, what is happening.” I want this window to be about all of it, and why. The ‘why’ of fashion. That's what I love most.

You're not going to find a top ten list of things to wear to make your waist look slimmer, but you'll probably find a history of the corset, and why we can thank women’s liberation for not having to wear those suckers anymore (unless we want to!). You'll never find anything close to the title of “What guys love!” because frankly, I couldn't care less; but you'll find what we at The Attic love, and we’ll even dig through our entire wardrobes just to tell you which dress (or jumper! or trouser! or shoe!) we love the most and why. You'll find discussions on aesthetics, history, politics, literature, identity, and even yourselves, because I also want to know what fashion means to you. Because fashion is in everything. It's everywhere. So let's dive in.