Simple clothes aren’t simple to design. That’s Lesson No. 45 from a book entitled 101 Things I Learned in Fashion School by Alfredo Cabrera and Matthew Frederick. As it was meant to do, it taught me some things about fashion, like the meaning of some terms I’d heard before but wasn’t completely sure about. Prêt-à-porter, for example, means ready to wear, while haute couture refers to the exclusive fashions of the Parisian designers’ houses. I learned one designs into the fabric, meaning one ought to develop a silhouette only after choosing a cloth, as even a well-conceived garment can be ruined if cut into the wrong material.
Overall, the book drew me in not so much because I wanted to gain an all-encompassing knowledge of the fashion world, though I do find it interesting, but more because I find fashion—like architecture, design, art, music, and sports, among many other things—rife with all sorts of metaphors and incisive lessons that inform us about how we might choose to live and to live better.
For instance, referring back to Lesson No. 45 on the notion of simple clothes, Cabrera and Frederick suggest that in garments with fewer design elements, “subtler considerations, such as proportion, line, and fit become magnified” requiring a more “highly refined understanding of and attention to anatomy.” That is, the more simple the piece, the more crucial its geometry, its balance. To ensure its beauty and attractiveness, one must more closely attend to the way it moves and falls upon the body under the force of gravity.
And, this notion—simple isn’t so simple—holds true in all sorts of other realms as well. For example, to land an idea in a listener’s imagination in the span of a brief five-minute talk might require more preparation than it would if more time were allowed. The structure of the argument employed must be pared down to its essentials. The exact right words must be chosen wisely, efficiently. If done correctly and carefully though, there’s a good chance the simplified version of the idea will lodge in the listener’s mind more clearly, more persuasively, and in the end, more durably.
Here’s another fashion lesson that might have some wider application: Lesson No. 34 urges designers to, every so often, step back and take a look. Designers spend a great deal of time sketching, cutting fabric, draping, fitting, and arranging prototype garments on mannequins or models. All the work is done at arm’s length or closer. “Good designers,” Cabrera and Frederick say, “take frequent steps back to see how their creations look from the distances at which they are likely to be viewed by others.” Lesson No. 34 warns that, “designers who view their work only from ‘working distance’ invariably find… on presentation day, that it looks very different from what they expected.”
Stepping back from the ordinary pattern of our days, the normal fabric of our lives, is a valuable thing to build into our routine. A new angle, a little distance, often reveals something we hadn’t yet seen—sometimes preventing a mistake we were about to make or perhaps showing us that what we’re doing is working well and that we should proceed with confidence on the same path.
It’s good advice. Think about what this might look like for you. Every once in a while, in some way, step back and examine what you’re doing, what you’re creating. Consider it from a distance or from a new angle. Sometimes we’re so close to the events of our daily existence, so tightly embedded into the cloth of our own circumstances, we fail to see that, through all of our difficult close-up work, something beautiful is being created. Something redemptive is emerging. Frequent steps back help us bear witness to this.
This sort of good fashion sense—a fashion metaphor put to good use—even pops up in the Bible from time to time. In the third chapter of Colossians, Paul instructs us to clothe ourselves in compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience. It’s a simple message—durably memorable and clear. Beautiful, cut from the right cloth. Offered to us not just from Paul but from the Great Designer of all things, ready for us to wear.
God—Help me simply to take a step back every once in a while and see what You want me to see. Amen.
