Life lately: February 2023 recap
Fashion criticism, industry changes, and preparing for a super intense month of trips and events
Dear fashion thinkers,
As I promised a couple weeks ago, I’m slowly returning to my mission of thinking—and writing—openly about fashion over here… which means that my monthly recap is back! And today I somehow feel the obligation to update you on what’s happened in my life over the past five months.
But I’ll try to be brief.
I left right before I embarked on a couple weeks of travel and intellectual inquiry inn October. I visited Los Angeles to view Ilona Katzew’s Archive of the World and New York for the Museum at FIT’s symposium on Latinx Fashion. And while both trips were truly amazing, they now feel like the last deep breadth before I basically spent the next four months writing, thinking, editing, and writing some more until I finally submitted the final draft of my dissertation only about a week ago.
Being buried in my “dissertation writing cave” (as I like to call it) left me with little to no time to write anything other than my dissertation. And the stress—and even burnout—that came with it, left little to no energy to even celebrate all the highs and lows of last year (though I did give it a try on an Instagram post in late-December).
The biggest accomplishment was that the book Threads of Power, for which I wrote a chapter on lace in colonial New Granada, was featured among The New York Times’ best art books of 2022. I wish I could have celebrated it more! But I’ve started to lean into the philosophy of “better late than never,” so here I am sharing it publicly (again)! And maybe I’ll manage to convince Emma Cormack and Michele Majer, the true masterminds behind the book, to go out with me for a celebratory drink next time I’m in New York.
I did try to celebrate a bit more every single one of the last steps of completing my dissertation—submitting the last chapter, going through the last round of edits, sending it to my committee—all of which have actually happened this year and most of which are recorded in some form on Instagram.
The celebration will continue next month, when I defend my dissertation and finally become Dr. Laura. (Side note: I’ve been trying to prepare my friends and family to actually call me “Dr. Laura” but no one seems very convinced… I’ll have to report back on whether I manage make it happen or not 😅)
But before we move on to everything that March will bring (at least to my tiny space in the universe), here’s what I’ve been reading this month:
1. Fashion book of the month:
I promised myself upon completing the full draft of my dissertation that I would not read anything related to fashion or art (outside of what I need to prepare to teach my classes), but it’s turned out to be mission impossible. An email from one of the people I admire the most in the fashion intellectual sphere introducing me as a “fashion critic with an acute and interesting view” made me want to delve deeper into the subject of fashion criticism—which I’d been wanting to forever but my Ph.D. got in the way. So I’ve spent the past week or so with Peter McNeil and Sanda Miller’s Fashion Writing and Criticism: History, Theory, Practice (Bloomsbury, 2014).
The book is short and sweet and offers an introduction to the development of the figure of the critic in the art world and how it got translated into fashion, especially by figures like Charles Baudelaire and Oscar Wilde. A second part of the book contains “snapshots” of fashion criticism, with the aim of explaining how the strategies of art criticism were carried into fashion criticism, all while a new vocabulary for writing about fashion emerged.
As an introduction to the subject, the book works perfectly well. But I’m left, as always, with the question of how the Euro-North American vision presented in the book extends to Latin America. And, although I’m certainly interested in the subject, I’m not sure I’ll be the one to conduct such research and write about it. But only time will tell…
2. Fashion articles of the month:
Selecting one single fashion article is harder than choosing just one book, especially because I now have time to indulge myself with reading the fashion press every morning (and one of the side-effects of obtaining a Ph.D. is the ability to read very avidly and fast). So I’m listing my top three:
A lot has been said about Pharrell Williams’ appointment at Louis Vuitton, but I found Jon Caramanica’s ideas particularly thought-provoking: For him, “cynical reads of Mr. Williams’s appointment — as a simple and perhaps craven acknowledgment of hip-hop’s ongoing influence on contemporary men’s wear — are insufficient.” Instead, Williams is a sort of cultural translator, standing between music and fashion, “old money” and “new money,” and design and broader social discourses in fashion. The success and impact of Williams’ appointment, however, will only be seen in due time.
Another popular subject, especially in relation to the collections presented in the ongoing fashion month, has to do with the rise of understated luxury—what Vanessa Friedman recently called ”the Camelocracy” and can be defined as:
the kind of clothes that don’t advertise their value in obvious ways (decoration, logos, jangling paillettes, bright colors) but instead rely on plushness of fabric and rigor of line — on insider information rather than influencer information — to suggest value. That don’t shout, but whisper.
Finally, I couldn’t ignore my dearest colleague and friend, Sandra Mathey García-Rada’s recent essay published in Fashion Studies, where she explores the discourses behind the construction (or shall we say performance?) of Peruvian identity in Mario Testino’s exhibition “Alta Moda”.
3. Non-fashion read of the month:
You probably know at this point that I spend a lot of time thinking about education (and not just because I’m technically a fashion educator, among other things). So when I stumbled upon an essay on the popular learning styles theory, I couldn’t help but read the full thing. I’m still mind blown by the fact that, despite evidence pointing to the many lacks of this theory, we all seem to blindly stick to it. And this—like so many other things in education—needs to be changed!
Coming up in March
March will be a huge month for me, packed with even more trips and events than the last time I wrote this monthly recap (back in September).
I’ll be traveling to San Juan to speak about my research on tailors in colonial Quito and Santafé (present-day Bogotá) at the Renaissance Society of America’s annual conference. Later in the month, I’ll be traveling to Europe for a couple of events with Culturas de Moda. And in the final week of March, I’ll be back in New York to participate in the Parsons MA Fashion Studies annual alumni panel.
But, beyond all the exciting trips, March will also be super meaningful because I will be defending my Ph.D. dissertation after 5 years enrolled in my program and pretty much my entire adult life working towards this degree. Magically, my dissertation defense almost coincides with my birthday—so I’m certainly planning on celebrating more than ever this year!
As always, I’ll be sharing my adventures on Instagram, so make sure to follow along over there!
What have you been up to in the past month? I’d love to see your very own content recommendations in the comment section! (Or you can reply to this email and send them privately to me if you feel more comfortable that way.)
Until next time,
—L.