This year, in Seattle WA., a death salon will be held. Now, I'm not talking about a beauty shop with people dressed up like they belong in halloween town (although that would be cool) it's more like a death convention. Anything and Everything you want to know about death, dying, the science behind it, and how to mourn will all be covered. Now it's important not to romanticize death, but to understand that it will happen to everyone and be prepared for it when it dose happen. Sadly, I can't go to this event because I have other responsibilities that take place on the same day. I can, however have a little chat and waffle on about death, on this blog. If you don't feel particularly comfortable with these topics feel free to just skip these posts in their entirety. Each post will be labeled with "of death and darkness" for connivence. Now on to the purpose of the post!
Death's grip on fashion
I recently read an article called
"A Fashionable Death" on rookiemag.com and began to think of how fashion and death are closely linked. Krist Burton quickly runs though how tuberculosis went from an undesirable illness to must have accessory. I began to think about how frailty and beauty correspond. In japan the byojaku (sickly) trend popped up about two years ago. Ideally, the makeup should make one look sick, and frail. Now I'll be completely honest, I personally like this trend. I think, in part, because it shows how makeup can give a person extremely different looks, and in part because it's
just make up. There's no need to harm oneself in order to get a certain look. I vaguely remember the 90's American trend of looking dangerously thin and looking back made me realized that i never thought anyone actually harmed themselves to get "the look". I now know that I was mistaken. If we were to go back in time a bit further to the Edwardian period we would notice that women would put Belladonna (aka deadly night shade!) in their eyes to make them dilate and appear larger. This led to eye infections and even blindness. The women also used lead based lipsticks because they provided the best saturation but they also led to lead poisoning. I suppose the "beauty is pain" concept had been around for ages.
Fashion's connection to death hasn't always had a negative impact on society, take the victorian era for example. Mourning clothes and jewelry were a staple in ones wardrobe. Feel free to check out this article on
Death and mourning during the victorian era for more information.
Fast forward to the 1980's and you get a subculture based on post punk music and the resurrection of gothic literature. This was combined with the rediscovery of antiques and a heavy emphasis on the DIY movement inspired by the punk scene. The end result was the start of the goth subculture (well, back then it was called a counter culture, but i digress) Now there are a lot of sub-styles of goth fashion but aristocratic seems to stem from mourning clothes. I know of a goth who loves to wear mourning veils, and it's an accessory that's also common in gothic lolita (all hail MANA-SAMA!)
As time goes on, I think(or at least i hope) people have learned and are continuing to learn that you can get any aesthetic without harming your body.
