SPOTLIGHT

Photos: Vogue Runway, Shutterstock Supermodel Helena Christensen modeling the iconic Versace S/S 1994 clothespin dress, famously worn by Elizabeth Hurley From the birth of Gianni Versace's ubiquitous fashion house, Versace has always been exceedingly good at advertising and publicity, pushing the envelope with insanely fantastical, glamorous, and controversial campaigns as well as using celebrities for promo. They have carved some of the most unique and fateful fashion moments from the stars that brandished their frocks. One of the more notable examples was Elizabeth Hurley's audacious and bodacious clothespin-bolstered dress from Versace's S/S 1994 collection.  The year was 1994, and the high fashion industry was only just starting to gain traction as an important and noteworthy fragment of pop culture. Elizabeth Hurley was simply an up-and-coming actress of mild notoriety from her boyfriend, the widely sought-after and adored Hugh Grant, who recently had starred in one of...

Photos: Ron Galella and Getty Images Met Gala looks through time: Bianca Jagger at "The Eighteenth Century Woman", 1981; Cher at "Romantic and Glamorous Designs", 1974; Diana Ross at " The Eighteenth Century Woman", 1981. For the average person, the first Monday of May is simply another day. Nothing unusual or remarkable. But in the fashion world, that day is a culmination of nearly a year's worth of work and effort. For some, it's practically a holiday; it's the Met Gala, a momentous occasion that heralds the advent of celebrities from all industries to the prestigious Met Museum, also called the Metropolitan Museum of Art, for the fundraising of its Costume Institute. The Met Gala - recognized at first as the Costume Institute Benefit - was founded by fashion publicist Eleanor Lambert in 1948 and was created as a way to publicize and raise funds for the Costume Institute - initially known as the Museum of Costume Art. It was only two years be...

Image by Conde Nast Archive/Vogue Runway Supermodel and Galliano muse Linda Evangelista wearing the closing look, a canary yellow tulle and feather bouffant evening dress with a boned bodice from John Galliano 'Pin Up/Misia Diva' S/S 1995. Galliano considers this moment one of the first major fashion moments in his career and credits the presence and mien of Evangelista in the dress for its repute.  John Galliano was only a buzzing designer in November of 1995, having rumbled critics and the fashion community alike the year before with a stellar collection. It earned him the job as creative director of French fashion house Givenchy and put him on the map as one to watch. Linda Evangelista was one of the top supermodels at the time and a regular in major fashion publications like Vogue, Harper's Bazaar, and Elle. She had also modeled for Galliano's aforementioned landmark collection. Both were thriving figures in fashion at the time and would find themselves intertwined ...

Kate Moss photographed by friend Juergen Teller, 1999. For almost a decade, the iconic and instantly recognizable photo of Kate Moss swathed in a white duvet from the neck down, her bright pink hair splayed all over the pillows with a light boyish smile etched on her face, has been a touchstone for 90s/noughties Tumblr and the decade altogether.  But the story behind the infamous hair is just as iconic. Kate at Versace S/S 1999. For Versace's S/S 1999 show, Donatella Versace requested (on quite a whim) for Kate's hair to be dyed pink. The hairdresser who did the dye job, Laurie Foley, talked to newbeauty.com in 2018 , recalling the experience. "It was all hush-hush. They drove kate in a car with a hat on and snuck her into the atelier, inside Gianni [Versace]'s old spa in Milan. It took at least eight hours because we had to get that brunette off of her without damaging the hair." The pink color was a special and specific shade meant to match the accessories for t...

Jenny Shimizu, Kate Moss, Kirsten Owen,  Lois Samuels, Stella Tennant, Trish Goff,  and others  for CK One by Calvin Klein F/W 1994.  Photographed by Steven Meisel. Music and fashion have always had an inextricable link - icons like David Bowie, Elton John, Diana Ross, Prince, and Madonna have wielded fashion as a means of expression beyond music. But it was in the 1990s that we witnessed the rise of a genre that shaped pop culture, music, and fashion for nearly half a decade: grunge. Nirvana photographed by Stephen Sweet, 1993. | Soundgarden photographed by Ed Sirrs, 1994. The gritty and distorted sound that originated from Seattle in the late-1980s was a sonic fusion of heavy metal and the post-punk rock that had been developing in the late-1970s as a result of a massive pivot away from punk's conventionally raw edge and conciseness. Bands like Soundgarden and Alice in Chains were at the forefront of the Seattle-bred scene. In 1991, a then-obscure band by the name ...

Do you see yourself in fashion? And no, I don't mean literally.  Do you see your own shape and size? Is it marketed with the same frequency and intensity as the typically thin and unchanging figures filling the advertisements on glass partitions in the mall, billboards, or in magazines?  It wouldn't be far-fetched to imagine that most readers would say no, and that's ok. It's not by coincidence. Fashion, in all its beauty and grandeur, is still flawed. For a long time, exclusivity was not merely commonplace but standard; think white, willowy, and statuesque models like Linda Evangelista and Christy Turlington, who ruled the fashion world in the 90s. And while revolutionary figures like Iman and Naomi Campbell made it possible for black and POC models to be as visible as their white counterparts, there has yet to be a real presence in fashion that embodies and champions the broad range of shapes and sizes that exist out in the real world.  It's only in recent years t...

In March of 2020, the world stopped. A little-known disease named Coronavirus, or Covid-19, had finally made itself a global problem. The World Health Organization declared it a worldwide pandemic, and countries swiftly took action, shutting down major cities and halting all travel. In an instant, everyday people and public figures alike found themselves confined to the four walls of their homes with no foreseeable end to the adjournment of life as they recognized it. In all of this change and chaos came the term "pandemic fashion". The standard of everyday clothing went from jeans and some a top to anything from a sweatshirt with sweatpants to pajamas, tracksuits, or even the baggy Disney t-shirt you had bought years ago that was collecting dust deep in the closet. With errands, in-person commitments, and social gatherings becoming a thing of the past, the purpose of clothing shifted from function to comfort. Silhouettes became looser to make extra room for those frequent tr...

Fashion, for some, is associated with vapidity and frivolousness; a waste of time, money, and effort for fabric that will ultimately end up on a rack and eventually on someone's body. Sure, the argument isn't completely invalid and can even be considered fair, but one thing is definite -- fashion is not just that. It would be unjustified to say it's a hollow monolith. It is so, so much more. It's art, often crafted with the same meticulousness as sculptures and paintings. It's a barometer of the current social, economic, and political tenor. For some, it's even salvation -- magazines, runway shows, and movies are their doorways into faraway lands, enveloped in anything from chiffon and silk to leather and lace, that guide them through turbulent times. It gives people room to feel safe, to disconnect from a reality that is often hard to handle.  Fashion, to me, is art because only art can make you feel such inspiration, reverie, and exuberance. Maybe it sounds a ...