Karl Lagerfeld died on February 19th after decades as the creative powerhouse behind Chanel and Fendi. Back in 2009, the late designer quipped that “in a meat-eating world, wearing leather for shoes and even clothes, the discussion of fur is childish.” While, characteristically, he lacked nuance, Lagerfeld had a point: many strongly-held cultural viewpoints conceal a form of hypocrisy.
Fashion is now irrevocably intertwined with political correctness. We philosophise every photograph or garment, meaning that for some designers, true success is measured in pro-vegan protests, Instagram hashtags and i-D think pieces. Though visuals are the cornerstone of fashion, designers are increasingly aware that being talked about is just as important as being seen; and these money-making gaffes are much easier for audiences to concoct when they are laid bare on the garments themselves.
Maria Grazia Chiuri’s wild appropriation of feminist slogans has earned her social capital among impressionable millennial customers. Dior is now “accessible” because women can pay £600 to wear something “woke”. Viktor and Rolf’s absurd text on their otherwise exquisite SS19 couture dresses were unashamedly designed to provide fodder for meme culture, and for what – a pithy Instagram caption? These designers insist that we wear our hearts on our sleeves, so that fashion becomes not much more than a vehicle for going viral, for clout, for expressing political opinions. Fashion for fashion’s sake is now rare.
Behind these self-referential, navel-gazing design tropes, is the unspoken notion that women can only justify looking beautiful and wearing nice things, if they balance it out with an awareness that it’s not “enough” to just look good. They have to make a political statement too. And the right kind of political statement. The bottom line is the notion that beauty itself – however one perceives it – is less “worthy” than other qualities. Karl Lagerfeld believed that “fashion is neither moral or immoral, but it is for rebuilding the morale”, and proved his attitude to be the exception to the rule. Modern luxury fashion tries its hardest to imbue a moral code into every fibre. In the process, simple admiration of beautiful clothes is being made an immoral and socially irresponsible act.
What the fashion world will miss most about Karl Lagerfeld is that he gave us no choice but to simply experience something beautiful. We were not invited to read between the lines. He never indulged the drive towards “wokeness” and never cowed to the PC brigade. The final Chanel show in Paris on Wednesday was a quintessential Lagerfeld spectacle, a Swiss ski resort set up in the heart of the French capital. The collection was full of long tweed coats, decadently crystallised ski jackets and snowball dresses that embodied Chanel’s aesthetic and kept the brand in the all-important forward momentum.
Perhaps we should stop literally weaving meaning into fashion, and simply let the clothes do the talking, as Lagerfeld did. Superficial, hedonistic, and vain beauty does not have to be negative, inadequate or unworthy; as Lagerfeld said: “vanity is the healthiest thing in life.”
