What Is Fashion?
Fashion is a way of wearing clothes or accessorizing that is in style at a particular time. It includes a wide range of styles and trends that are followed by individuals, groups or societies. Fashion also includes the creation of new clothes and the design, manufacture, and marketing of shoes, bags, and jewelry. A garment is considered finished when it has been embroidered, beaded, laced or sewn together. The final touches include attaching buttons and hooks or snaps, sewing on a label specifying fibre content or laundry instructions, and pressing the garment before shipping it.
During the early twentieth century, fashion magazines began to appear and gained great influence over the public. The first fashion magazines featured beautiful illustrations of elegant clothes and were published in major cities across the world. Designers, who were previously confined to haute couture, now started ready-to-wear lines which they heavily promoted in these magazines. Television also began to feature fashion shows and segments.
A fashion trend usually begins when people who have high social status or are popular start to wear new or different clothes. Other people then copy this style. This can lead to a chain reaction in which other people then copy the latest style even if it doesn’t suit them. Then a cycle occurs where the latest style becomes old and then a new fashion begins again. These trends may also be influenced by events and culture, for example, the wars in Europe in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries caused changes in clothing styles. Fashion can also be influenced by exploration of other cultures.