fashion friday
This week’s fashion update was none other than work-elevator inspired:
In a Condé Nast article, we learn of the 70’s REVIVAL
Huge 70’s designers, like Halston, are bringing back classic American fashion this year thanks to new ownership.
“When reports of the fall 2008 collections begin to hit the press, you might feel you’ve entered a time warp. Four of the biggest fashion names of the 1970s—Halston, Bill Blass, Ungaro, and Loris Azzaro—have been on varying degrees of the sartorial back burner for years. In some cases, there’s been a dress or even a collection here or there. In others, new designers and runway shows have cropped up, without resulting in enough buzz or profit to signal a comeback.
But this season, each one has deep-pocketed new owners—among them movie mogul Harvey Weinstein and Silicon Valley entrepreneur Asim Abdullah—with the talent and teams in place to potentially launch major revivals. Fashionistas get a chance to see two of the born-again labels, Halston and Bill Blass, during New York’s Fashion Week, which runs until February 8.
I’m thrilled for the comeback.
As a child of the eighties, I can’t help but feel like I missed out on some incredible fashion trends when I look at photos of 70’s fashion.
From the feathered hair to the toga-draped sundresses, it just seemed like the 70’s were about looking great and knowing it.
There was no fear of color or style, and it just seemed like people wanted to have fun from interior design to beachwear.
I got a forward of a JC Penny catalogue from ’77 that really made me feel like I really could have flourished in that decade had I been conceived early enough.
Now, I can’t speak for the men, because many of them seem happy NOT wearing tight clothes, but some of the ladies’ fashion already has a clear influence on today’s runways. 70’s-inspired apparel can be found on retail shelves from Nordstrom’s to WalMart.
But I will promise had we been twenty years older, you would never have caught us in these matching vestments.
How do I say I’m sorry?
My new favorite place of inspiration is the elevator at work. First, it struck me with an odd, but entertaining experience with “freakout woman,” I’ll name her—and now, thanks to the news headlines/random fact and/or word of the day screen plastered on the wall, I have today’s post:
Today, Australia Premier Kevin Rudd made a formal apology to the Aboriginal population for years of mistreatment and racism.
“The Parliament is today here assembled to deal with this unfinished business of the nation, to remove a great stain from the nation’s soul, and in a true spirit of reconciliation to open a new chapter in the history of this great land, Australia,” Rudd told the parliament as reported in the New York Times article here.
How kind; that after years of oppression, abuse and hatred towards an entire group of people, whose subjected inferiority was based solely on their skin color, bone structure and cultural tradition, the simple notion of apology offers a symbol of regret from the oppressors, and a sincere motion towards a peaceful future.
Hmm. Me thinks to me-self, there in the elevator, did anyone ever apologize for slavery? Wait, what about the Plains, Navajo, Cherokee and other tribes of Native New World inhabitants?
Fittingly, with this month being Black History Month, I was boggled with the idea of someone actually apologizing for racism in America.
<<It is a good rule in life never to apologize. The right sort of people do not want apologies, and the wrong sort take a mean advantage of them.
P. G. Wodehouse (1881 – 1975), The Man Upstairs (1914)
Thankfully, some southern states like Virginia are admitting to wrongdoing and hoping to symbolize a future where racism is not just avoided but discouraged.
Also Alabama, whose governor signed a formal slavery apology last year seen here (thanks for the link, Meg), has helped pave the road for others in making a plea for forgiveness after playing key roles in America’s embarrassingly unethically immorally dehumanizing inhumane history.
Why should/shouldn’t other states apologize?
Personally, I admire the gesture. While I clearly don’t need an apology to continue setting high goals and expecting to achieve them as an ambitious young black woman, the simple notion that some people acknowledge the horror of slavery as an abominable part of history is encouraging.
To think that some people born to privilege (white people— there, I said it) recognize their unfair advantage over black Americans and carry guilt with them for that truth softens my idea of racism in America, as noted by the DeWolf family secret, as seen here (article tip thanks to the anthropologist, Meg, again).
While I have always been “the black girl” growing up, and experienced racism in the worst ways possible as a little girl, many of my white friends have expressed an unspoken appreciation for our friendship as being a means of understanding the past—with shame—but moving onward and upward as equals.
I would hope that none of them ever feel the need to apologize to me for being white, descending from slave owners, but I wouldn’t reject something to that tone coming from states that still have gift shops with the confederate flag printed on everything from socks to contact lenses.
In the end, I can’t help but think of a very catchy commercial:
Deciding to invest in a nation built on the torn backs of slaves… millions of dollars
Importing millions of Africans to the New World… billions of dollars
Trying to pay off the mistreated instead of just admitting wrong… trillions of dollars
Acknowledging but rebuking a repulsive past…priceless
…Of course, don’t stop the trillions coming, if that makes you feel better.
<<I am an expression of the divine, just like a peach is, just like a fish is. I have a right to be this way…I can’t apologize for that, nor can I change it, nor do I want to… We will never have to be other than who we are in order to be successful…We realize that we are as ourselves unlimited and our experiences valid. It is for the rest of the world to recognize this, if they choose.
Alice Walker (1944 – ), Democracy Now Feb. 13, 2006
P.S. in other news, I’m starting a new tradition called wordless Wednesdays. On Wednesdays, I’ll post a picture that is worth a thousand words. Enjoy
blind elevator
This morning I was just about three steps behind a woman who was headed straight for the elevator.
She stepped in the elevator and the door started to shut. I got to the doors just in time to stick my foot in and catch it on the way up.
The doors didn’t open.
Just when my low-budget-scary-movie fate of my leg going up with the elevator and ripping from my body flashed before my eyes, the door did in fact reopen.
“Phew, I’m glad that worked!” I said as I joined the woman inside the lift.
With a big harrumph and a roll of the eyes, she stormed out of the elevator to the set just en face of ours, and agitatedly pressed the UP call button for another elevator!
I have no idea what happened. And I rode the elevator up alone with a look on my face not unlike my son’s at that blowfish.
And that’s my story of the day.
