By Monica Sklar,
June 18th, 2008 at 6:22 pm
(Uncategorized)
Today is Worn Through‘s first birthday!!!
I had wanted to start a fashion/dress related blog for a while, and finally a year ago I got it together and did it. Over the years I had become an active blog reader, with my Bloglines account and my endless bookmarks taking up a good portion of each morning and/or evening as I check out the latest news on an array of subjects from the tabloids to the war and everything in between.
Of those blogs there were, and still are, a selection of fashion blogs I think are smart, ahead of the curve, well designed, and/or simply fun to check out. But, there was a gap in material covering dress and culture, and specifically the academic/museum/researcher/writer end of things, and I was having trouble finding one spot to look for particularly aimed at my interests. There were a few which would come and go, or post very, very rarely, but nothing consistent.
Hence, Worn Through was born, and has been a labor of love all year. Readership has gone up, down, and now back up higher than ever (yeah!), and it’s gone from just me, to the inclusion of contributors such as Heather and those who regularily feed me ideas via personal emails (keep them coming).
At times it has seemed fruitless, when full time school was its most busy, and I was working at my job on top of that, and doing multiple extracurricular endeavors on top of that(!), not to mention trying to maintain a normal social and family life. But, readership has continued to grow, and now whenever I go to a academic conference, fashion function, or various events people always want to talk about Worn Thorugh, which has not only warmed my heart, but also made me realize that this is a valuable forum and centralized location for people into dress and culture to have solid and reliable information on a regular basis.
While I still plan on working with the avenues of magazines, books, journals, and museum exhibits, I have developed a real faith in blogs as a legitimate and viable way to communicate with a wide-reaching audience, which truthfully journals and the like cannot always attest to, as they are burdened by their limitations of time, space, and accesbility. One of my goals with WT is to break through what I consider to be academic (and related) elitism, and to provide a site for intelligent discussions on dress in a way that invites anyone to partipate. I also wish to continue diversifying the content, as much as possible within the theme, to keep it interesting, and to appeal to as many people within dress and culture as possible, since the field ranges from retail to textile science to history to feminism to subcultures to museum studies to global experiences to a million more topics!
So with that I hope to have another year of growth for WT, and I promise to continue to publish the things you look for such as exhibit reports, job opportunies, and book reviews, and also further develop ideas which promote vibrant conversations. In the next year you can probably look for addtional contributors added to the WT team, and I invite you to actively participate in creating WT‘s content by writing comments and emailing me with your ideas.
So if I do say so myself…Happy 1st Birthday to Worn Through and thank you readers for continuing to make this a fun and worthwhile endeavor.
-Monica
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By Monica Sklar,
June 18th, 2008 at 11:31 am
(Exhibitions, Uncategorized)
To go along with Heather’s book review post part 1 in which she mentioned Pat Warner, I thought I’d let you know that the museum I work at, the Goldstein Museum of Design, has an upcoming exhibit entitled From Sportswear to Streetwear: American Innovation, and for that exhibit there will be a related symposium October 10 at which Pat Warner will be the keynote speaker. The symposium is open to the public and accompanies a weekend class being taught by Warner on sportswear on at the University of Minnesota-which is open to anyone to take.
If you missed Heather’s post, Warner wrote the book When the Girls Came out to Play: The Birth of American Sportswear. The exhibit will feature items from the Goldstein’s collection including designers and brands such as Gucci, Ralph Lauren, Lilly Pulitzer, Valentino, Converse, and Juicy Couture. The dates of the exhibit are August 15-November 2. Click here for more details.
1 Comment
By Heather Vaughan,
June 17th, 2008 at 2:38 pm
(Conferences and Calls for Papers, Uncategorized)
“The Many Layered Meanings of Costume”
The Southeastern Region of the Costume Society of America announces its
2008 Annual Symposium
October 31st – November 2nd
Williamsburg, VA
Hosted by:
The Colonial Williamsburg Foundation, The College of William and Mary, and
The Jamestown-Yorktown Foundation
Symposium Highlights Include:
- Juried paper presentations and research exhibits
- Keynote address by Caroline Weber, author of Queen of Fashion
- Behind-the-scenes tours of host facilities
- New Preserving Our Past workshops
- New quilted clothing and object exhibition at CWF
- Marketplace and Silent Auction
- All Hallows’ Eve Costume Dinner and Catwalk
Call for Abstracts: The symposium title is designed to be broadly themed and attract research papers and exhibits from all areas of costume studies. Preference will be given to those abstracts which present research into the cultural significance of costume, explore the meaning of the word costume, study layered and/or quilted objects of adornment, update formerly presented research, offer important new conclusions, or raise stimulating new questions. Research papers will be given in 20-30 minute presentations; research exhibitions will be presented in a single venue for approximately 2 hours.
A submitted abstract must designate whether it is for a research paper or exhibition, is to be 575 words or less excluding bibliography, and may include up to 3 pertinent images. Abstracts for research exhibits should, in addition to discussing the research, briefly describe the exhibit format, i.e.: traditional poster, 3-dimensional objects, lap-top presentation. All abstracts are to be submitted electronically; the author’s name and contact information are to appear only in the e-mail cover letter, the abstract text is to be a Microsoft Word document attachment. All abstract are due by midnight July 30 to fburroughs@cwf.org . Submitters will be notified of the jury’s decision before August 15. For further information contact Doris Warren (dwarren@cwf.org) or Mark Hutter (mhutter@cwf.org), or call 757-229-1000 ext.2538.
Details on the CSA website
Until next time,
Heather
www.fashionhistorian.net
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By Heather Vaughan,
June 17th, 2008 at 5:00 am
(Book Reviews, Uncategorized)
Fashion v Sport
by Ligaya Salazar (Paperback – Jun 1, 2008)
Ligaya Salazar’s book charts the history of the connections and business affiliations between the fashion and sports industries (from the Belle Epoch era to the present) and including an examination of high-performance textiles. Salazar is curator at the V&A and given the extremely high quality of their exhibits, I would suggest that this is most likely an excellent account. Personally, I’m looking forward to getting my hands on it. I wonder though, if one compared it to the American Sportswear books (such as When the Girls Came out to Play by Patricia Campbell Warner or American Ingenuity: Sportswear 1930s-1970s by Richard Martin) how these histories might match up or overlap. Fashion V. Sport was also recently reviewed on Style.com.
Juergen Teller: Vivienne Westwood by George Shaw and Juergen Teller (Hardcover – Jun 1, 2008)
Documenting the photographic ad campaign executed for Vivienne Westood’s Spring/Summer 2008 collection by Juergen Teller, this bit of eye candy is likely to have little analysis, though the photographs may stimulate thought all on their own.
Pop Surf Culture: Music, Design, Film, and Fashion from the Bohemian Surf Boom
by Brian Chidester and Domenic Priore (Hardcover – Jun 1, 2008)
Written by an author who lives and breathes Los Angeles pop culture (documentary producer, pop culture magazine writer, etc), Pop Surf Culture is clearly basing its marketing campaign on the impending arrival of Summer. That said, I’m skeptical of its academic contribution. I would suggest that this book is for a general trade audience, rather than the academic market (though with pop culture titles, it is often hard to tell). The product description at Amazon does not tell us how many photographs are included, or how much of this includes information about fashion, but it does say that the book explains, “why surf culture is a vital art movement of the 20th century.” Perhaps its worth a look.
I’ll post a few more reviews later this week. In the meantime, for more fashion focused books (academic and museum related), visit The Good Reads Fashion Historian Resource Group.
Until next time,
Heather
www.fashionhistorian.net
1 Comment
By Monica Sklar,
June 16th, 2008 at 10:20 am
(Uncategorized)
I rarely do product plugs on Worn Through but my friend Dana sent me a link to her friend Danielle’s new jewelry line and it is really pretty stuff. Lots of natural materials like bamboo, coral, and fossils. Plus, I recently visited San Fran where they are, and saw it in person, and it really looks great close up. And….Dana is a model on the site, so I thought I just had to have you take a look. The company is: ESHO fine jewerly by Danielle Meshorer and you should check it out. Sorry I don’t have a pic, you’ll just have to go to the site to see it.
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By Monica Sklar,
June 15th, 2008 at 11:29 am
(Conferences and Calls for Papers, Uncategorized)
The Association for the Study of Jewelry and Related Arts is having a conference October 11-13 in Boston. The theme is: Ahead of its time: Artistic jewelry in the milieu of 1900. Click here for more details.
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By Monica Sklar,
June 15th, 2008 at 11:22 am
(Uncategorized)
The other day Wired featured a fun photo gallery of images from WonderCon 2008 which was a convention for enthusiasts of comics, superheros, sci-fi and the like.
The pictures are a lot of fun and remind of how about two weeks ago I was at a local Barnes and Noble and stopped in my tracks as I head someone in a microphone say, “Let me tell you a little story about my time with Yoda.” My ears perked up and I quickly grabbed Harlo to make our way through what turned out to be a huge crowd to find an author of Star Wars fiction giving a talk, flanked by at least 15 or 20 people in full Star Wars regalia. High quality costumes too and for every character one could imagine. It was a fantastic way to perk up my magazine buying evening and I so admired (and was entertained by) everyone’s enthusiasm. So bummed we didn’t have a camera and cell phone photos weren’t going to do justice to the amount of time these individuals put into those costumes.
My colleague and friend Theresa Winge has written two articles on cosplay which you can check out:
Winge, T. M. (2006). Costuming the imagination: Origins of in Anime and Manga cosplay. Mechademia: An Annual Forum for Anime, Manga and Fan Arts, Vol. 1. Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press.
and
Winge, T. M. (in-press). Undressing and dressing Lolita: A search for the Identity of the Japanese Lolita. Mechademia: An Annual Forum for Anime, Manga and Fan Arts, Vol. 3. Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press.
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By Heather Vaughan,
June 12th, 2008 at 1:42 pm
(Uncategorized)
Related to my post of a few days ago, the New York Times today discusses another alternative to buying direct retail in a struggling economy, now impacting nearly everyone: High End Consignment,
“Everyone is feeling the pinch these days or knows people who are feeling the pinch,” said Linda Kenney Baden, a prominent lawyer in New York. “It’s good to buy a used car again, and it’s chic to buy used clothes.”
Heather
www.fashionhistorian.net
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By Monica Sklar,
June 11th, 2008 at 4:49 pm
(Conferences and Calls for Papers, Uncategorized)
A conference entitled FASHIONS: BUSINESS PRACTICES IN HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE has a call for papers with a deadline of Sept. 15. Send a one-page abstract and one-page resume to: Dr. Roger Horowitz, Secretary-Treasurer, Business History Conference, POB 3630, Wilmington, DE, 19807. The conference is in Milan, Italy, and they are offering grant money to graduate students for travel. They are looking for historical papers on fashion and fashionable business trends, as this is part of the European Business History Association and the Business History Conference joint meeting. Click here for details.
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By Heather Vaughan,
June 11th, 2008 at 9:00 am
(History of Dress, Uncategorized)
I was recently asked by a budding radio journalist about the history of Clothing Swaps. She was particularly interested in how different generations have perceived trading clothes and if it were something that had been going on for a long time. I did some research that I found rather interesting and thought I would share with you. Clothing Swaps as they are known today (where groups of women pay a fee to get together with other women and exchange clothing) have been around longer than you might think. They recently came to the attention of the masses after a 2006 article in the New York Times profiling Suzanne Agasi. However, this was far from the beginning. (Though Suzanne claims that when she began doing them in 1996, no one had heard of them).The clothing swap as we know it today began in the early 1980s, and continued through the 1990s. The 1980s swap was in response to the increase in consumer culture and also to the women’s movement. As more women moved into the workforce, they began to need office appropriate attire.
“Can’t bear to open your closet door one more time and face that tired, lackluster, out-of-date wardrobe? Outraged by high department store prices for new clothes? Bored by traditional resale shop selections? Wondering what to do with last season’s sequined knickers or Aunt Millie’s best-forgotten feather boa gift? Don’t despair. Relief is on the way. The name of the game: the Great Clothing Swap.” (Washington Post, 1982).
In 2003 San Franciscans were throwing Swaps for their friends, and by 2006, costly luxury swapping parties (with admission fees) were becoming increasingly popular. Swapping has become an international trend (popular in both the UK and Australia). Even more recently, Lindsay Lohan has become the spokesperson of Visa Swap where by you donate clothes to earn points (to buy new clothes).(Lindsay Lohan in swapped clothes)
Earlier in the 20th Century, Clothing Swaps began to be reported in the popular press in response to the war time restrictions of World War II, along with the ‘make do and mend’ campaign. Initially geared towards children’s clothes (especially twins), they eventually expanded to provide used clothing for adults. These swaps were usually organized by schools or charitable organizations and were especially popular in the UK. These were specially orchestrated to keep swappers anonymous (to protect peoples identities and the embarrassing situation of needing to swap clothes).
“Today, this novel scheme has been expanded as a war conservation measure, into a full-fledged neighborhood clothing exchange. It’s a plan the people of any community might well adopt to the benefit of themselves and their country. Sales are held every Monday afternoon now, for adult as well as children’s wear, under the supervision of women volunteers from the school’s parent-teacher association. . . .To counteract any hand-me-down stigma, things are kept on a strictly impersonal basis. . . . The garments are entered in a record book and the owner is given a number. On each article is placed a tag bearing the price, fixed by the owner, the size and the owner’s number. The owner’s identity is of course, buried in this process. The garments are displayed on racks. When an article is sold, the tag is removed, put in an envelope with the money, and the owner’s name written on the outside. He collects at leisure.” (Saturday Evening Post, 1943)
The trend again appeared briefly in the 1960s. (Of course this is just 20th Century history, and the 2nd hand clothing trade goes very far back in the history of fashion – I might post on that later). That’s the basic history, but it brings up some interesting points. Such as why are they so popular now? When and why has the stigma of wearing and buying used clothing dissipated? In my conversation with the journalist we talked about how the ‘greening’ of the economy has infiltrated everything, and how swapping is yet another ‘earth friendly’ way of getting new clothes (and also plays well into liberal guilt). We also discussed how the overproduction of goods allows for this type of recycling to occur, and how the clothing swap plays into counter culture (particularly in the Bay Area with Critical Mass as well as with the DIY movement, vintage fashion, and anti-consumerism).The Sex and the City movie even came up as an example of the ultimate in label-hording and escapism (similar to the fantasy films of the 1930s used to help viewers escape from the depression). When one considers the history of consumerism and over-consumption, it could be argued that swapping may lead to a reversal of the consumerist trend.(The Ladies at Mercedes-Benz Fashion week for no reason – aside from product placement)
My feeling is though, that the economic recession has more of an impact on this trend than any other social or cultural element. As the recession’s impact is felt further up into the middle and upper middle class, innovative bargain hunting will continue to flourish in new and innovative ways.This topic has so many facets to it, that I may continue to research it for a while and present it elsewhere. I will let you know when the radio program will air.
Until Next Time,
Heather
www.fashionhistorian.net
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