Fashion or Style?

Try to chart the course of fashion and you’ll need more than a sexton, compass and telescope, to navigate to its beginning. The rise and fall of fashion is like waves in a storm filled ocean. Charting the course of style is much easier, it has a known beginning, its progress can be documented and unlike the turbulent fluctuations of fashion, style dictates a constant theme that has the ability to cross cultural barriers and oceans. One prime example of style to note is Harris Tweed; it’s been constant through many decades of fashion fluctuations. The dark business suit dates back to the early nineteenth century, initiated by Beau Brummell, this style continues today. The tie dates back thousands of years. For the past eighty years the tie as we know it has remained pretty much the same. So let’s drop a few names of individuals who initiated styles, Coco Chanel, Jean Patou, Beau Brummell, Amelia Bloomer, Jessie Langsdorf, Tommy Nutter, Vivian Westwood, Oxford University, and Cambridge University. It’s all history, but like fashion history has a habit of repeating itself, actually fashion is just repetition of style. “Style is constant, fashion comes and goes”