Who Decides What Constitutes Fashion?

Tavi Gevinson of Style Rookie

I love magazines and clothes and shoes as much as the next girl. But I’ve realized that while I admire pretty things, I often dress for comfort, or for warmth, or in styles that don’t exactly challenge the prevailing aesthetic.

Which is part of the reason that I’m so impressed with women who have a serious sense of fashion, and an understanding of what makes beautiful clothes and innovative design, and how to put it together. I’m told — although I’m not sure that I would have known this on my own — that blogger Tavi Gevinson of Style Rookie is one of these women (do we call a 14-year-old a woman? Sure.)

But in a recent blog post, Gevinson talks about the fact that kids at her school mocked her outfits until they found out that she was being sought out by the likes of Vogue:

“What was so great about dressing up in middle school was when people got really confused and sometimes even angry and had the most entertaining responses, but now a lot of them think they’re supposed to like my outfits because some magazine does, and as a result, I am never challenged. The best was when people found out about this blog, and said things like, “Wow, I would not have guessed you care about fashion.” Which I loved — I don’t want to look like someone who cares about fashion.”

Sure, these are kids. But most adults aren’t much better at differentiating between a fashion mastermind and someone who suffers from colorblindness. Tavi probably looks, to most of her peers, like that girl we all knew in middle school who wore crazy outfits and dyed her hair weird colors. And yet Anna Wintour thinks she’s a genius.

So who makes fashion fashion? Without the Tavis of the world there would be no innovation, but then again without fashion groupthink, a la, Tavi’s middle school peers, there would be nobody to sell to.