Ask Hadley

Apart from making a few individuals and companies obscenely rich, what purpose does fashion serve?

Pete, by email

Gosh, I don’t know, Pete. Maybe you could tell me what purpose sport serves other than making the very few obscenely rich and the masses fat and lazy from sitting all day watching pointless matches on TV? And I’ve always wondered, what’s the point of the film industry? Or art? Or fancy cars? Or anything, really, that’s not basic, boring and bland?

Obviously there’s no real purpose to fashion in the way there is a purpose to, say, water or the sun. But if one takes for granted that making life that little more enjoyable for those who like it is, in itself, a purpose, then I guess fashion does serve one. More of one for some of us than crummy cricket and flipping football; less of one for others. If you wish to go around town in a burlap sack or a beige boiler suit, by all means, boiler it up to the max. I could launch into some diatribe about fashion being a form of self-expression, art and commerce all combined in one unique form but I see no need for overcompensatory special pleading on fashion’s part. The purpose is the same as the purpose of Premier League football: to make some people very wealthy and to make others forget the pointlessness of existence for at least a few minutes a day.

(Source: Guardian)