“In order to be irreplaceable, one must always be different” Coco Chanel
“oh, wow I love your coat where did you get it from!?” “your shoes are lovely!” do these quotes seem familiar to you? Walking up to a stranger on the street after her blue and grey check coat catches your eye – the item may not be the same but we’ve all been there, admiring a woman’s dress sense – just needing to know where its from or simply just telling her you love it. Women on the street inspire us, maybe not that we would wear something but just that they look so fabulous wearing it. The outfit you wear or an Instagram picture of you in all your fashion glory can now get you noticed, and if seen by the right person – famous. Seems that no longer needing qualifications or luxe fashion experience to call yourself a stylist, fashion blogger/writer (we doubt it), and it seems all you need is an opinion and a good (or completely wacky) fashion sense. But can an outfit really make you famous? Look at some in demand bloggers who’ve made it big from a fashion blog/Insta account (Julia Engel – Gal meets glam, for example) and it looks like it could be.
The clothes we wear express who we are but with fast fashion becoming bigger than ever we can end up looking quite similar, so you can see how being a bit different or rather unique, can make a woman on the street a bit of a style icon. Bloggers and the Insta famous may be the darlings of the fashion world (for) now but the woman who dresses for herself rather than x number of likes is the real inspiration. Street style is a runway, it’s what ‘regular people’ wear every day and is the shape and colour that everyone adds on their days, it shows their passion, their uniqueness and proves that you don’t need thousands of pounds to put a style icon worthy outfit together. These everyday fashionistas could be on a magazine cover and yes indeed are fashion page worthy.
“Trendy is the last stage before tacky” Karl Lagerfeld.
Where the obsession of nameless fashion blogs and Instagram famous ‘stars’ came from?
Perhaps it was social media making it possible for anyone to post a picture or create a blog, fast fashion making it even easier and cheaper to keep on top of trends or was it the photographer Scott Schuman who in 2007 decided to photograph people walking outside of the London fashion week shows rather than the people going inside. It’s something that has stuck – how many magazine pages are dedicated to the fashion worn outside of London fashion week than inside this year? What Schuman created was an idea that if you had good taste and were at the right place at the right time you could become famous - if only for a while.
It also set in motion that if you could dress to get noticed and talk about it well, then you could become a fashion blogger.
That’s not to say it’s easy – you need passion (not a passion to get famous) and an unwavering amount of patience to, also, maintain your popularity as blogger/Instagramer.
“Style is a way to say who you are without having to speak” Rachel Zoe.
words by Casey Milano