Friday 23 September 2011

Interim Post: what? And: how? And: why?

Posted by Tania Kindersley.

I was just thinking: maybe I was a bit mean about fashion. Some of the frocks are lovely, after all, and people have their jobs to do. Just because I do not get a thing does not mean it has no validity. (I do not understand Wagner, or Joyce, and they are both geniuses.) One must not fall down the subjective rabbit hole and start confusing opinion with fact.

And actually, it turns out Alberta Ferreti is doing some lovely coats this year.

Then I saw this:

image

It is a leather miniskirt by Balmain. BALMAIN. One of the great, enduring names of fashion, a name that at once makes me think of elegant Faubourgs and Grace Kelly and women who never went out to lunch without a hat.

It’s not the item so much, although I do think it is quite silly. I suppose it has some kind of post-punk, post-modern, deconstructed appeal. If you were eighteen with very long legs, you might look fabulous in it.

It’s the fact that it costs NINE THOUSAND FOUR HUNDRED AND THIRTY POUNDS. That’s: £9430. (I really do try and avoid excessive and excitable capital letters, but there are times when italics are just not enough.)

Has no one told the people at Balmain that the world economy is teetering on the brink? Are they channelling the Emperor Nero? Shall they get out their fiddles and play as the Euro burns? Or are they just taking the piss?

Thank you for letting me get that off my chest. Proper blog later.

6 comments:

  1. I kind of like it - it is nicer than a lot of recent Balmain but I think nearly £10,000 is excessive for a skirt with safety pins on it.

    Hope you are feeling better today.

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  2. I can see many practical difficulties that might cause a red face (safety pins coming undone, fastening one to sofas … ).

    Tough choice for the leggy eighteen-year-old: leather mini skirt or a whole year's education?!

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  3. Personally i think the balmain people are a sadistic lot who must be laughing up their (probably gap t shirt) sleeves at anyone who would buy this!! They may just be in cahoots with Monsieur Louboutin!! xx

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  4. Hi...just found you via The Bottom of the Ironing Basket...such a brilliant blog...love it!
    I'm a new follower!!
    Have a great weekend.
    Catherine
    http://www.catherinerobinsoncashmere.com/

    ReplyDelete
  5. The fact that the big fashion houses do "punk" and frayed and torn clothing has annoyed me for years. Poverty is not cool it is very upsetting. Teenage rebellion is a different thing. Erika

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  6. This amuses me because I am a slightly secret follower of Project Runway. And now in my head is a little Michael Kors making a snippy comment about "What woman would want to have pins and needles on her crotch?"

    I'm not a fashionista by any means. I have noticed that it is harder and harder to find cute, comfortable clothes that don't make one look old-ladyish... or the opposite extreme....

    ReplyDelete

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