Style vs Fashion - Topic of the day 8/30/24
Two often interchangeable terms but for real: what is 'style' and what is 'fashion'? Are these universal concepts or do they depend on the person? Is it possible to being fashionable without being stylish or stylish without being fashionable, and if so how? How much does style or fashion impact your choices in what to wear? And is the wonderful graphic used an example of something stylish, fashionable, both, or neither?
75 Replies
I think of style as a skill you can develop by paying attention to fashion.
I feel like this is bait
Me or the topic?
Wearing vs Styling :nails:
The topic
I'm sure y'all have had this conversation a million times, but I find it fun to kind of parse
It kind of gets at the individual expression vs conversational aspects of clothes
Style is for boys fashion is for men
Or something
style vs fashion is something i hear as not quite a dogwhistle but its something that gets used to delegitimize stuff that the individual doesnt like a lot of the time
pedants get in here
I think the most neutral way to put it is to say that style is your personal expression and fashion is a collective expression. The two are intertwined and influence each other back and forth.
I’m super jaded but “style” over “fashion” seems to often be used to degrade someone for being trendy whatever that means
I think you can still have the discussion in a value neutral way
yeah this is a better idea in the vein of what i was trying to say
hell of a reference image
Agreed. It's an interesting topic but most conversations on it online are very uninteresting
To me the conversation is very “enlightened redditor” coded (derogatory)
I guess I'm lucky that I haven't seen them ha
Something i find interesting about this topic is that while this all seems to be the consensus on mfa or whatever a lot of respected designers in interviews will draw a distinction saying like im not trying to do fashion im not interested in fashion
Dries van noten comes to mind as someone i know has said it but its a pretty common sentiment
To give a genuine answer, fashion seems to encompass everything about clothing and dressing yourself as well as the industrial machines of clothing manufacture and clothing media. It's like saying universe, it means everything. Style is more often used to refer to the way clothing is worn on a personal level i.e. styling different pieces. When you're talking about someone's style you're usually referring to their ability to choose clothing (taste) as well as their ability to combine clothing in a unique way, often alongside hair makeup and accessories.
If you ever want to suffer, go to r/MFA, sort by most popular, and go to some thread about wide fits being in
I want to to see a follow up totd of swag vs style
"Wide might be fashionable but I still think it makes you look like a thug"
:harold:
Avoiding the brain-rot portion of the discussion I've always felt like "fashion" generally referred to larger entities: the industry, general trends, etc. So if someone is "fashionable" they're active and participating in those things (not derogatory). While "style" always felt like something specific to an individual.
idk I think there's a difference when someone is "fashionable" vs "stylish" in a way
I also can't express how little interest I have in hashing out the reddit/brain-rot part of this topic. We get it.
"So glad I have a timeless style (4% elastane skinny chinos) rather than being a slave to fashion"
I really don't see the difference tbh, I guess that's my hot take
Me too brother
That’s a good point by Sal and Beans, as whenever I see this topic I assume “fashion “= trends, so maybe I’m missing context because of that
I see them as mostly synonyms
it's one of those things where I feel like you should treat it like how laypeople do and just use it interchangeably
bc the fact that there's a distinction turns into a way for people to shit on each other
:hell:
sal saying it better than me and first
Yeah I don’t think the good discourse is connected to the brainrot dogwhistle discourse in any way other than they’re using the same words
Yeah. Some people use them non synonymously, but its so uneven it would be impossible to make a useful distinction at this point
imo that's not wrong, it's just a bit reductive. Trends are obviously part of the larger "universe" or zeitgeist or whatever term you want to use and they're the most visible. And likely how most people end up participating in fashion
My hot take is you can't be stylish without being aware of trends
And having them affect your style
Fashion is a conversation yada yada yada
Whether style, swag, taste or whatever, I do think there is use in having a word that denotes the ability to curate and combine pieces artfully and convey some sort of point of view, independent of the larger fashion context
I think the biggest difference is that style is possessive while fashion is collective. It feels weird to say "he has great fashion" vs "he has great style".
I have great fashion (all my monthly income goes to it plz help)
Fashion is sort of impersonal way to talk about clothing while style is usually very personal
Referring to a nebulous industry vs referring to the way a person or group does something
fashion is more like a music genre, it can describe a type of clothing that is worn. style can mean your own personal take on something but it can be a sorta subgenre
lolita is the fashion, gothic is the style.
reading this thread i have learned that the definitions are not as clear as i originally thought
Idk music genres are kind of impossible to define. Strong centers, nebulous boundaries
true but when your looking for led zep, you usually aren’t checking the new wave crate
like although it is nebulous there usually is some level of structure given to things like music and fashion just because it’s convenient
Maybe it’s a good comparison I’m not going to think about it too hard, sorry to object
nahh it’s all good!
i’m just explaining how i came to the conclusion lol
i dunno i personally am bad at figuring out both fashion and music genres so i kinda study them a bit so i don’t panic when someone asks me
Fashion the signifier style the signified
Or the snake to my mongoose
huh?
what does that mean
A stop sign is a signifier or symbol. what it means to you, ie, stop, is what is signified.
no the snake and mongoose part
And the dr evil reference cause i dunno if you should swap style and fashion out
the snake leads and the mongoose follows it
oohh
or chases it, historically
i dunno i mean i think im going my the textbook definition of fashion and style i guess
If i speak in truncated riddles people will think im smarter than I am
my general understanding is fashion is a big tent umbrella; one can combine various aspects of fashion to be deemed stylish and/or cultivate one's personal style
yeah those r probably true i just dont think abt it
plus i dunno what to call
the subgenres
of like a main style
or fashion?
this is confusing!
i am careful to say "aspects of fashion" because it's not just aesthetic (imo)
things like design, manufacturing or construction techniques, material choice, and how one interacts with clothes would all fit in this umbrella
Lolita is NOT fashion
true….
it has lots of lifestyle factors and etc but like……. i don’t think abt it this much so this is a very interesting discussion
at its crux lolita is a book which has inspired other things that aren't books
modes of dress, lifestyle, etc
like the victorian lookin stuff?
i am NOT talking abt the book
or what the book talks abt either
the “girls dressed as porcelain dolls with knee length dresses” thing
ribbons and bows and frills and lace, hoop skirts, whole nine yards
i just like being gothic n the victorian era undertones r cool……….
i mean i’ve been looking into a couple pairs of period women’s ankle boots just because
but now i’m uber sidetracked
they look so cool tho…. but i’d like to get some that actually last
As far as I understand it the Lolita subculture developed as a way to express femininity without being sexualised and is essentially a feminist movement in Japan.
This has apparently devolved into just another fashion subculture in the west.
yes!!!
At least that’s what acquaintances of mine active in that scene have told me
i’ve been trying to get into it (lolita fashion is v expensive..) and basically all lolita communities HEAVILY police their communities to rid them of any perverts or predators.
(to clarify i make no associations to the topic of the book, just the style)
to clarify i was not referencing the subject matter of the book but the subculture that came up
re fashion vs style that's a way to distinguish the two - during the victorian era that type of dress would've been considered fashion as it's how most dressed, whereas now it's moreso an individual person's style
whether it's considered "stylish" is somewhat contextual (as is every trend or style) - if one is in an environment of people who appreciate it it's gonna be received differently than if someone is within a subset of all people
yeah
stylish is up to interpretation of the person judging
one sec imma leave this discussion for a bit cuz i’m entering the state of hearing words and they no longer have meaning
when someone is called “stylish” it feels derogatory vs being called fashionable
SWAG IS FOR MEN CLASS IS FOR BOYS
I am drunk and refuse to expand on this
wait fuck this is the good explanation
if i hear someone "has great style" i think of their ability to style pieces of clothing, while if i hear someone "has great fashion" i think of the pieces of clothing that they own