Who, what, wear
Clothes maketh the man, so the story goes. Clothes also showeth that the way man dresses is a signifier of the tribe he belongs to—or aspires to belong to. This was the contention of New York designer and stylist Andrea Lieberman, who famously put Jennifer Lopez in THAT dress—the barely there wisp of green chiffon by Versace—for the 2000 Grammy Awards.
Lieberman and I had met in Johannesburg in 2006 and spent a few days together hanging out as a group of us toured diamond mines and livelihood centers, as well as Soweto. She was designing a new collection of jewelry for Mouawad, while I was covering her visit for WWD.
We fell into a discussion about fashion and uniforms, clothing as expressions of individuality as much as conformity.
Dress for the job
We all know the types. Bankers and stockbrokers donned suits and ties and black brogues; gallerists and curators wore black; tech bros switched the rules of office dressing, trading crisp collared shirts for T-shirts, jeans, sneakers, and baseball caps.
Steve Jobs made the black turtleneck shirt his personal signature and spawned a thousand copycats, while Anna Wintour opted for her bangs and bob, sunglasses, and ladylike outfits, which no one else dared to copy, except at Halloween. Besides, it’s unlikely that anyone could pull that look off with conviction.
These style tribes exist in the Philippines, too. The polo barong executives. The Comme des Garçons-admiring fashionistas. The midriff-baring, Alo-wearing Pilates girls.
And then, of course, there are the politicians.
“So let them eat cake” energy
Nothing says politician on the campaign trail like a collared cotton pique shirt sporting the color of their political party—from the yellows of the Liberal Party to the green of the DDS team, the red of the Uniteam, and the pink of the Kakampinks.
And nothing says grandstanding elected official making an appearance—finally—in front of their suffering constituents like a Prada T-shirt that was allegedly pulled out of the closet without much thought and the Burberry rain jacket thrown over it. Or a matching Balmain logo jacket and pants.
Imelda Marcos claimed she dressed in splendid ternos when she mingled among the masses because it was uplifting for them to be confronted by such beauty, or something to that effect. But those days of bedazzling the poor with a display of riches are frankly “so let them eat cake” energy.
How a mayor of a city literally trying to stay afloat after torrential downpours washed away their homes and turned their streets into rivers thinks, “oh, today, I’ll wear Prada,” is just obscene. Forget the fact that they’re generally not attractive people. Marcos, for all her avarice, was undeniably spectacular in her prime—and she weaponized her beauty shrewdly as a smokescreen for a dictatorship.
Tone deaf behavior
In this age of instantaneous social media feeds, sartorial tone-deafness among public servants should be an off-with-their-heads moment. Firstly, for their outdated notions of not just what is fashionable, but what projects luxury and wealth to the people they serve. And secondly, the fact that they think they should project such luxury and wealth makes them sh*tty and vainglorious public servants.
And they are. Because a truly caring and hardworking public servant would not have told their constituents to just pray, and to understand that these things happen every year and that they should prepare for it. A truly caring and hardworking politician would have actually built that damn flood control system to protect their constituents in the first place.
They would have even been knee-deep in those floodwaters, helping their constituents to safety.
Logomania gone wrong
Seriously, why does anyone—much less a mayor—think logo-branded designer clothing is even remotely chic? What is it about the Filipino psyche that makes someone suddenly awash with public funds want to blow it all on clothes that scream pricey but tacky?
I could forgive someone who could carry this logomania look if they knew how to wear it with irony. That would be clever. But our politicians are rarely known for their sense of irony. Or style.
One would think that they’d have watched “Succession” at least to understand that the signifiers of wealth these days are not to be found in a blatantly branded piece of clothing. But in the end, that awful Prada shirt, or that tasteless Balmain outfit, is the provincial Pinoy equivalent of Melania Trump’s “I really don’t care, do you?” Zara jacket.
Who wants to be part of that tribe anyway?
******
Get real-time news updates: inqnews.net/inqviber
