# Does the fashion industry really dictate fashion?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-the-fashion-industry-really-dictate-fashion/619317
**Category:** Cafe Society
**Created:** [April 19, 2012, 8:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-the-fashion-industry-really-dictate-fashion/619317 "2012-04-19T20:34:12Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@tdn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tdn)
#### Post date: [April 19, 2012, 8:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-the-fashion-industry-really-dictate-fashion/619317/1 "2012-04-19T20:34:12Z")
There’s a scene in _The Devil Wears Prada_ where Andy, a newbie at a fashion magazine (and a bit of a fashion disaster herself) is assisting Miranda, the editor of the magazine.
> [@](#):
>
> Miranda Priestly: [Miranda and some assistants are deciding between two similar belts for an outfit. Andy sniggers because she thinks they look exactly the same] Something funny?
>
> Andy Sachs: No. No, no. Nothing’s… You know, it’s just that both those belts look exactly the same to me. You know, I’m still learning about all this stuff and, uh…
>
> Miranda Priestly: ‘This… stuff’? Oh. Okay. I see. You think this has nothing to do with you. You go to your closet and you select… I don’t know… that lumpy blue sweater, for instance because you’re trying to tell the world that you take yourself too seriously to care about what you put on your back. But what you don’t know is that that sweater is not just blue, it’s not turquoise. It’s not lapis. It’s actually cerulean. And you’re also blithely unaware of the fact that in 2002, Oscar de la Renta did a collection of cerulean gowns. And then I think it was Yves Saint Laurent… wasn’t it who showed cerulean military jackets? I think we need a jacket here. And then cerulean quickly showed up in the collections of eight different designers. And then it, uh, filtered down through the department stores and then trickled on down into some tragic Casual Corner where you, no doubt, fished it out of some clearance bin. However, that blue represents millions of dollars and countless jobs and it’s sort of comical how you think that you’ve made a choice that exempts you from the fashion industry when, in fact, you’re wearing the sweater that was selected for you by the people in this room from a pile of stuff.
Is this true? Do fashion designers consciously select what the hot new look is going to be, or do they merely predict what is naturally going to happen next? Do they jump on the bandwagon, or are they the bandwagon?
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### Author:  [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)
#### Post date: [April 19, 2012, 8:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-the-fashion-industry-really-dictate-fashion/619317/2 "2012-04-19T20:59:45Z")
> [@tdn](#):
>
> Is this true? Do fashion designers consciously select what the hot new look is going to be, or do they merely predict what is naturally going to happen next? Do they jump on the bandwagon, or are they the bandwagon?
AFAIK, designers select and buyers (i.e., the people who look at new designs and collections and advise on what should be incorporated in mass-marketed fashion lines) predict. But in a sense, the prediction of an influential buyer is just as determinative as the inspiration of the designer.
Sure, it’s up to Galliano or Lagerfeld or Kenneth King or Kate Spade or whoever to choose a particular look/style/color/feature/whatever to be a signature element of their current collection. But what manufacturers choose to throw their financial and marketing weight behind is what the “definitive look” of the current fashion will be. And, of course, recent years’ “definitive looks” influence even the most independent-minded and trend-setting designers in creating their new looks.
For example, the company Pantone annually selects a “Color of the Year”, based on recent color trends in design, that is then announced and focused on by various fashion and design magazines. Is Pantone selecting the current year’s “hot color”, predicting it, or a mixture of both?
For 2012, BTW, it’s “Tangerine Tango”:
> [@](#):
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> The 2011 color of the year, PANTONE 18-2120 Honeysuckle, encouraged us to face everyday troubles with verve and vigor. Tangerine Tango, a spirited reddish orange, continues to provide the energy boost we need to recharge and move forward.
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> “Sophisticated but at the same time dramatic and seductive, Tangerine Tango is an orange with a lot of depth to it,” said Leatrice Eiseman, executive director of the Pantone Color Institute […]
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> Over the past several years, orange has grown in popularity and acceptance among designers and consumers alike. A provocative attention-getter, Tangerine Tango is especially appealing in men’s and women’s fashion. Fashion designers featured in the PANTONE Fashion Color Report Spring 2012, including Tommy Hilfiger, Nanette Lepore, Cynthia Steffe by Shaun Kearney, Elie Tahari and Adrienne Vittadini, are incorporating this attractive orange into their spring collections. A fun, lively take on a traditional autumnal hue, Tangerine Tango will surely carry through to fall fashion as well.
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### Author:  [@a35362](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/a35362)
#### Post date: [April 19, 2012, 9:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-the-fashion-industry-really-dictate-fashion/619317/3 "2012-04-19T21:04:09Z")
I’m waiting for **Eve** to weigh in…
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### Author:  [@Justin\_Bailey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Justin_Bailey)
#### Post date: [April 19, 2012, 9:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-the-fashion-industry-really-dictate-fashion/619317/4 "2012-04-19T21:29:30Z")
> [@tdn](#):
>
> Is this true? Do fashion designers consciously select what the hot new look is going to be, or do they merely predict what is naturally going to happen next? Do they jump on the bandwagon, or are they the bandwagon?
I can’t speak for women’s fashion, but men’s fashion just doesn’t filter down that way. My shopping is done almost exclusively at Target and Kohl’s, and both stores carry roughly the same selection of shirts I’ve been browsing for years.
I lost one of my favorite button-up shirts in a washing machine incident a few years ago. The shirt was like 5-6 years old, but I was able to replace it with an identical one from Target on the same day.
I saw that same shirt on the rack when I was at Target last week.
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### Author:  [@salinqmind](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/salinqmind)
#### Post date: [April 19, 2012, 9:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-the-fashion-industry-really-dictate-fashion/619317/5 "2012-04-19T21:59:21Z")
I’ve read articles about fashion designers who try to get a feel for what’s fashionable now from observing the young n’ hip in clubs and on the street, and incorporate those impressions into their designs. I don’t know if they still sit down and declare “this will be the New Look for fall 2013” (which literally happened after WWII with Dior, but maybe they were predicting then that women would be ready for a drastic change after years of wartime shortages).
I can’t speak for men’s fashions, they are much of a muchness throughout the decades. Men feel extremely daring wearing colored shirts! But they still have cuffs, collars, and buttons as always.
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### Author:  [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor)
#### Post date: [April 19, 2012, 10:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-the-fashion-industry-really-dictate-fashion/619317/6 "2012-04-19T22:08:12Z")
They fell down in the 70s with the Midi skirt.
The ladies went for hot pants instead.
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### Author:  [@Eve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eve)
#### Post date: [April 19, 2012, 11:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-the-fashion-industry-really-dictate-fashion/619317/7 "2012-04-19T23:09:23Z")
> [@a35362](#):
>
> I’m waiting for **Eve** to weigh in…
Goodness, I have only been on the fashion reporting (and, of course, _wearing_) side of the business. Though in the early '80s I actually was a 7th Avenue showroom model, just like in the movies!
My two cents is, the fashion industry _tries_, bless its little cotton socks, to dictate what people must buy and wear next season; sometimes it succeeds, and sometimes it fails miserably.
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### Author:  [@tdn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tdn)
#### Post date: [April 20, 2012, 1:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-the-fashion-industry-really-dictate-fashion/619317/8 "2012-04-20T01:37:22Z")
> [@Kimstu](#):
>
> Sure, it’s up to Galliano or Lagerfeld or Kenneth King or Kate Spade or whoever to choose a particular look/style/color/feature/whatever to be a signature element of their current collection. But what manufacturers choose to throw their financial and marketing weight behind is what the “definitive look” of the current fashion will be. And, of course, recent years’ “definitive looks” influence even the most independent-minded and trend-setting designers in creating their new looks.
It sounds a bit like the stock market. Smart and/or influential people drive the economy, but they are as subject to gain or lose as the rest of us, if not more. The rest of us poor schlubs buy our outdated stocks and ties at K-Mart.
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### Author:  [@tdn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tdn)
#### Post date: [April 20, 2012, 1:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-the-fashion-industry-really-dictate-fashion/619317/9 "2012-04-20T01:40:58Z")
> [@Eve](#):
>
> Goodness, I have only been on the fashion reporting (and, of course, _wearing_) side of the business. Though in the early '80s I actually was a 7th Avenue showroom model, just like in the movies!
You get my vote as Most Fascinating Doper Ever. If we ever meet at a 'fest, I’m buying you your first 'tini. No doubt it will have something weird and fun and expensive in it, like a fermented squid. I’m cool with that.
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### Author:  [@Zsofia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zsofia)
#### Post date: [April 20, 2012, 2:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-the-fashion-industry-really-dictate-fashion/619317/10 "2012-04-20T02:39:29Z")
Seriously, I want to know all about that showroom modeling (seriously, like in the movies?) thing!
Obviously the fashion industry does dictate something. I mean, people wear what’s available for them to buy. Now, the real bellwethers, the super-fashionable people you know, they might be buying vintage stuff or cutting up t-shirts or what have you. The rest of the world is buying what’s available at the stores. (Although it’s cute when the fashion world fails to predict a trend - for example, the whole Downton Abbey thing seems to have surprised them.)
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### Author:  [@Lamia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamia)
#### Post date: [April 20, 2012, 2:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-the-fashion-industry-really-dictate-fashion/619317/11 "2012-04-20T02:48:45Z")
> [@tdn](#):
>
> Is this true? Do fashion designers consciously select what the hot new look is going to be, or do they merely predict what is naturally going to happen next? Do they jump on the bandwagon, or are they the bandwagon?
As others have said, it’s a little of both. The fashion industry (not just the designers) determines what clothing will be produced and made available for sale, but the consumer has a choice as to what to purchase. However, with the exception of people who can design and create their own clothing, we do all need to buy _something_ to wear. With women’s clothing at least there can be trends that become so common that they are difficult to avoid.
There have been a number of times where I had some particular item in mind that I wanted to buy – nothing exotic, I’m talking things like a black three-button blazer – only to go to my local department store and find that this item was totally unavailable. I could buy a different style of black blazer that \*was \*available, put extra time and effort into trying to track down a black three-button blazer online, or not buy a new blazer at all. It’s even more common for me to find an item that I like but that isn’t available in the color that I’d prefer. So again, if I want to buy new clothes at all, I have to either choose from among the styles and colors that the fashion industry has made readily available or put more work into hunting down something different.
(On preview I see \*\*Zsofia \*\*has said basically the same thing.)
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### Author:  [@dangermom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dangermom)
#### Post date: [April 20, 2012, 3:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-the-fashion-industry-really-dictate-fashion/619317/12 "2012-04-20T03:02:06Z")
> [@Kimstu](#):
>
> For example, the company Pantone annually selects a “Color of the Year”, based on recent color trends in design, that is then announced and focused on by various fashion and design magazines. Is Pantone selecting the current year’s “hot color”, predicting it, or a mixture of both?
>
> For 2012, BTW, it’s “Tangerine Tango”:
I took my 11yo daughter shopping yesterday, and Penney’s had summer cargo crop pants in that exact color. (There was a lot of orange, but it was actually outweighed by the amount of 80’s nostalgia color: neons, jewel tones, and pale aqua and peach.)
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### Author:  [@wheresmymind](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wheresmymind)
#### Post date: [April 20, 2012, 3:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-the-fashion-industry-really-dictate-fashion/619317/13 "2012-04-20T03:19:46Z")
I once saw some sort of documentary on this question (How do we decide what’s cool? Who controls what’s in fashion?) They came to the conclusion that if you want to know what fashion will look like in 5 years or so, go down to your local high school and look at what the weird 14-17 year-olds are wearing. Not the _cool_ kids, but the edgy, quirky, misunderstood kids. The greasers, hippies, mods, punks, skaters, goths etc. They are the source spring of fashion and cool, and it slowly trickles up from there to the runways and department stores.
They gave many examples of this throughout the years (and used it to predict the popularity of cargo pants), and had some sociologists and psychologists on to explain why grown-ass adults subconsciously co-opt elements of fashion invented by 14-year-olds. Apparently it’s because we want to be young again. I have to admit they built a pretty compelling case.
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### Author:  [@Tarwater](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tarwater)
#### Post date: [April 20, 2012, 3:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-the-fashion-industry-really-dictate-fashion/619317/14 "2012-04-20T03:32:00Z")
> [@Zsofia](#):
>
> Obviously the fashion industry does dictate something. I mean, people wear what’s available for them to buy. Now, the real bellwethers, the super-fashionable people you know, they might be buying vintage stuff or cutting up t-shirts or what have you. The rest of the world is buying what’s available at the stores. (Although it’s cute when the fashion world fails to predict a trend - for example, the whole Downton Abbey thing seems to have surprised them.)
You’ve got it right, mostly. I think I would only argue with your example.
But why do you think those super-fashionable people are buying vintage clothes or cutting up t-shirts? They’re following a trend. It was a trend that was actualized a few decades ago when the fashion industry realized that a market exists for people who are nostalgic for old fashion.
People aren’t creating their personal styles out of whole cloth. They’re following trends that are (more or less) dictated by stylists who works for the fashion industry; or maybe the stylists who work for celebrities or artists, but in either case, they’re still members of the industry.
Only very rarely will you see somebody with a unique sense of fashion, unencumbered by the whims of fashion or style. These people are more or less industries unto themselves, though. They’re artists or creative types trying to establish their public identity in a world where most people are followers. If they’re popular enough, the fashion industry will take notice of them and iterate their ( their meaning the progenitors of the whole thing, the fashionable artists, whoever) for the SS14 line or the FW line or whatever. At that point, it’ll ripple down across the fashion hierarchy, moving from actual artists to dilettantes to reasonably fashionable people until you can find it in small boutiques and pop-up shops, and then eventually department stores.
So I’d say that the fashion industry dictates fashion for close to 99% of all people. It’s very hard to be unique. For most people, it’s not worth the trouble.
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### Author:  [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)
#### Post date: [April 20, 2012, 3:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-the-fashion-industry-really-dictate-fashion/619317/15 "2012-04-20T03:37:42Z")
Their efforts to pass off androgynous anorexic girls as the pinnacle of beauty has really taken hold. sarcasm.
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### Author:  [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)
#### Post date: [April 20, 2012, 3:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-the-fashion-industry-really-dictate-fashion/619317/16 "2012-04-20T03:42:24Z")
> [@salinqmind](#):
>
> I can’t speak for men’s fashions, they are much of a muchness throughout the decades.
Standard mass-marketed men’s clothing changes much more slowly over time than the women’s equivalent, that’s true. But there sure as hell are fashion trends in men’s **designer** clothing that change from decade to decade and even from year to year. Saggy pants, skinny pants, turtlenecks, collarless shirts, it’s **definitely** not an unchanging standard menu of identical items.
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### Author:  [@Tarwater](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tarwater)
#### Post date: [April 20, 2012, 3:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-the-fashion-industry-really-dictate-fashion/619317/17 "2012-04-20T03:43:56Z")
> [@wheresmymind](#):
>
> I once saw some sort of documentary on this question (How do we decide what’s cool? Who controls what’s in fashion?) They came to the conclusion that if you want to know what fashion will look like in 5 years or so, go down to your local high school and look at what the weird 14-17 year-olds are wearing. Not the _cool_ kids, but the edgy, quirky, misunderstood kids. The greasers, hippies, mods, punks, skaters, goths etc. They are the source spring of fashion and cool, and it slowly trickles up from there to the runways and department stores.
>
> They gave many examples of this throughout the years (and used it to predict the popularity of cargo pants), and had some sociologists and psychologists on to explain why grown-ass adults subconsciously co-opt elements of fashion invented by 14-year-olds. Apparently it’s because we want to be young again. I have to admit they built a pretty compelling case.
You’re probably thinking of _Merchants of Cool_. It’s a Frontline documentary, and anybody who wants to watch it can see the whole thing [here](http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/cool/view/).
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### Author:  [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)
#### Post date: [April 20, 2012, 3:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-the-fashion-industry-really-dictate-fashion/619317/18 "2012-04-20T03:49:39Z")
> [@Tarwater](#):
>
> So I’d say that the fashion industry dictates fashion for close to 99% of all people. It’s very hard to be unique. For most people, it’s not worth the trouble.
True enough. Even if you’re not wearing any of the **current** fashions, odds are you’ve got a mix of whatever was deemed to be fashionable last year or a few years ago or whenever the person who donated it to the thrift store where you found it originally bought it.
(I don’t say that superciliously by the way, I love not only thrift-store shopping but also making my own clothes when I can. But considering that even things like yard-good fabrics, garment sewing patterns, yarn and dyes and needlework patterns tend to be commercially mass-produced, there’s really hardly any such thing as making clothes independent of the influence of the fashion industry.
If you buy undyed cotton and wool fleece, mix your own dyes, dye and spin and weave your own fibers, and construct original patterns without looking at anybody else’s clothes while you’re doing it, then **maybe** the fashion industry isn’t significantly influencing what you wear. But even then I wouldn’t be too sure.)
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### Author:  [@Horatio\_Hellpop](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Horatio_Hellpop)
#### Post date: [April 20, 2012, 3:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-the-fashion-industry-really-dictate-fashion/619317/19 "2012-04-20T03:51:46Z")
There are two fashion trends the industry has been pushing very hard for in women’s fashion–too-long jeans with the cuffs folded once and pulled halfway up the calf, and jeans worn under a short-ish dress. They didn’t catch on with the buying public, and at least as much effort went into those looks as into the “cerulian blue” push.
I live in Korea, where boys wear Capri pants. Is this global, or some localized atrocity?
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### Author:  [@wheresmymind](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wheresmymind)
#### Post date: [April 20, 2012, 3:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-the-fashion-industry-really-dictate-fashion/619317/20 "2012-04-20T03:57:09Z")
> [@Wesley\_Clark](#):
>
> Their efforts to pass off androgynous anorexic girls as the pinnacle of beauty has really taken hold. sarcasm.
Someone can correct me if I’m wrong, but I was under the impression that runway models are typically thin, flat, and wear gaunt stage makeup because the focus is the clothes, not what’s underneath. They’re essentially walking hangers or sewing mannequins. In other words, the industry is cognizant of the fact that their runway models, as presented, are not the aesthetic ideal of a woman.
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