I find "taste" is such a loaded word for me. It invites us to feel virtuous about our judgment and even snobbery. I want to exercise my preferences and learn to sort things based on what my heart genuinely responds to. But I've also unsubscribed to so many things that start using words like "I hate xxx" around style (etc.) -- it all seems to go back to class, to a perception of "better than" that I am working so hard to buck against myself. Thank you so much for always sparking conversation -- and I loved your walking us through your "perfume" exercise!
Yes, absolutely -- taste IS a loaded word. That's basically its purpose: to have us compete for a higher position on the ladder, to put others down. It's really uncomfortable. I'm totally with you re: what the heart responds to. That's good enough for me.
I find it interesting (and also a little peculiar) that menswear writers who discuss taste flat-out admit that what's considered good taste comes from class, money and access to high culture, but womenswear writers tend to skirt around the topic of class, talking about taste as if it just meant preference. I don't quite know what that's about. Maybe we're just trying to be... nicer to one another?
Unfortunately I think it's the opposite -- we want to judge each other without admitting that's what we're doing. Maybe not even to ourselves. How often I hear: "That look is so local realtor. No judgement!"
I read the newsletter by Kara V that Tiia linked and she wrote “Once you see taste in this way, it’s difficult to see it as some inherent force that some people have and others do not, or as something that can be cultivated at will. Everyone has ‘taste’: we all know what we like, and we all judge those around us on their expressions of taste.”
Reading that gave me some relief to think that I’m not without taste as I’ve come to make myself believe!
I can relate to finding relief in this, too. I know what I like, and I don't really care all that much that my taste might not be considered "good taste". My taste is more important to me than the one that dictates social hierarchy... but then again I'm also in a position to think that because I can wear what I want at work, and no one will question my clothing choices openly. That doesn't mean that I don't sometimes feel out of place with my taste, but I try to trust my instincts and just go with what feels right to me.
I love that “Perfume” framework for analyzing taste evolution. Will have to try that exercise for myself!
I’ve been thinking a lot about “style by happenstance”; or, how much my clothing preferences have been shaped by random encounters and spontaneity at the thrift store during my formative years. When I look at my current wardrobe, I see my life’s story in it, with clues that trace to past iterations of my style (and myself).
"Style by happenstance" really speaks to me! Some of my favorite clothes are happy accidents. As much as I enjoy style analysis and planning my purchases, there's something really special about the clothes that are the products of chance encounters. They tell a story.
This was a really nuanced exploration, and I'm looking forward to diving into the further reading you've linked.
Lately I've been trying to treat the word "taste" more literally - like my taste in food, it's not supposed to be what anyone else wants me to eat; it's what *I* like that matters most of all. Different people think different things go together, have different favourites and dislikes (some of which are grounded in learned prejudice, while others are entirely arbitrary) and people can be incredibly judgemental about it, but you'll enjoy food more if you focus on and prioritise your own sensory experience over what you've been taught you *should* like. So it is with fashion taste.
Obviously the onus shouldn't all be on the individual, but it feels good to reclaim a bit of that power and put yourself first.
Yes to reclaiming the power of sensory experience! It's impossible to completely separate the personal experience from the larger, societal concept of taste, but I also feel that it's worth the effort to experiment. Learned prejudice and arbitrary likes and dislikes can be investigated and explored, and good things can come out of that.
How wonderfully you've broken down your style trajectory! It'll give me plenty to mull about this weekend...
I really like how you've taken a very nuanced approach to considering taste, both the dark side (its associations with hierarchy) and it's upside (cultural exploration!). I suppose for me it feels very loaded with the "dark" side, because coming from Asia, there was a lot of aspiration towards "western" society (not just aesthetics but even the values of a "western" democracy) and I'm still personally unlearning some of the things I internalised that made me devalue what I grew up with. What you wrote reminded me that we can hold all these ambiguities at once and still explore what we like, and why.
That's really interesting re: the cultural connotations of taste, aesthetics and values. I'd love to hear/read about it more. I've been going down the rabbit hole recently, investigating traditional clothing and costumes of various parts of the world, and how cultural colonization wiped them all away in what feels like a blink of an eye.
I find that I'm quite preoccupied with the dark side of taste as well. Coming from a lower middle class background and having one parent who was preoccupied with climbing the career ladder in order to pass for someone who has taste and to achieve the material goods associated with the upper middle class... well, there's been a lot of unlearning for me to do, as well.
Also, I think Stage 3 “Consumerism” of your exercise is a very normal component but it’s difficult played out over social media channels (ie hauls, SHEIN, etc). Reading this made me realize, Gen Z/ Alpha will, too, grow out of it too!
I hope they do, too! It's terrifying that young people grow up in this type of environment where they are taught to mindlessly consume, and of course it's much worse these days because fast fashion is so much, well, faster, than it used to be. It troubles me that the tenets of fast fashion (essentially, that clothes should be cheap and disposable) trickle down to the older generations as well. In my discussions with my older customers I hear them complain about poor quality in modern clothes all the time, but they still keep insisting that clothes should be cheap. I hear this at my shop at least once a week, and it's very discouraging. It's like the lessons these people have learned over the years have been sidelined by fast fashion propaganda. But maybe there's hope in the younger generations!
This!! I just finished trying to verbalize the mindset shift I’m trying to make from the previous “more is better” mindset that developed in my 20s. I am learning to spend more to get better even if that means my purchasing power decreases.
“Taste involves critical judgment and hierarchy. What follows is that you simply can’t discuss taste without the concept of class.” I’m grateful for your mention of this and I’ve bookmarked Kara’s newsletter to read. Jesica Elise has also delved into this side of the conversation with her knowledge and candor!
My brain has a hard time with this unless I differentiate between “good taste”, which is one thing, the very classist, normative thing, and “personal taste”, which is something else entirely, that we all have innately, though some give it more thought and turn it into something very refined and others go at it more intuitively and without paying a lot of attention. I don’t know. But I do think thrifting is an amazing way to develop your personal taste because you’re faced with so many varied choices and you have no other way of going about it but making strong decisions and creating personal taste formulas that work for you.
Lori, you have perfectly and very simply expressed what I wanted to say: this is about good taste vs personal taste. The problem with the Ezra Klein podcast episode and a lot of the conversations that followed (not to mention Rachel Tashjian's writing on the topic of taste that came before the Ezra Klein podcast) failed to make the distinction. I don't think the two can be separated, but certainly investigated.
I agree that thrifting is a great way to explore personal taste. I hate how thrift stores are becoming more and more "curated" or "styled" according to trends in Helsinki, because it takes away the pleasure of just letting the eye wander.
I find "taste" is such a loaded word for me. It invites us to feel virtuous about our judgment and even snobbery. I want to exercise my preferences and learn to sort things based on what my heart genuinely responds to. But I've also unsubscribed to so many things that start using words like "I hate xxx" around style (etc.) -- it all seems to go back to class, to a perception of "better than" that I am working so hard to buck against myself. Thank you so much for always sparking conversation -- and I loved your walking us through your "perfume" exercise!
Yes, absolutely -- taste IS a loaded word. That's basically its purpose: to have us compete for a higher position on the ladder, to put others down. It's really uncomfortable. I'm totally with you re: what the heart responds to. That's good enough for me.
I find it interesting (and also a little peculiar) that menswear writers who discuss taste flat-out admit that what's considered good taste comes from class, money and access to high culture, but womenswear writers tend to skirt around the topic of class, talking about taste as if it just meant preference. I don't quite know what that's about. Maybe we're just trying to be... nicer to one another?
Unfortunately I think it's the opposite -- we want to judge each other without admitting that's what we're doing. Maybe not even to ourselves. How often I hear: "That look is so local realtor. No judgement!"
Ah, yes. I recognize that in myself, too. It's hard to fight the inner mean girl sometimes. I will keep trying though!
I read the newsletter by Kara V that Tiia linked and she wrote “Once you see taste in this way, it’s difficult to see it as some inherent force that some people have and others do not, or as something that can be cultivated at will. Everyone has ‘taste’: we all know what we like, and we all judge those around us on their expressions of taste.”
Reading that gave me some relief to think that I’m not without taste as I’ve come to make myself believe!
I can relate to finding relief in this, too. I know what I like, and I don't really care all that much that my taste might not be considered "good taste". My taste is more important to me than the one that dictates social hierarchy... but then again I'm also in a position to think that because I can wear what I want at work, and no one will question my clothing choices openly. That doesn't mean that I don't sometimes feel out of place with my taste, but I try to trust my instincts and just go with what feels right to me.
YES. We all have taste.
I love that “Perfume” framework for analyzing taste evolution. Will have to try that exercise for myself!
I’ve been thinking a lot about “style by happenstance”; or, how much my clothing preferences have been shaped by random encounters and spontaneity at the thrift store during my formative years. When I look at my current wardrobe, I see my life’s story in it, with clues that trace to past iterations of my style (and myself).
"Style by happenstance" really speaks to me! Some of my favorite clothes are happy accidents. As much as I enjoy style analysis and planning my purchases, there's something really special about the clothes that are the products of chance encounters. They tell a story.
This was a really nuanced exploration, and I'm looking forward to diving into the further reading you've linked.
Lately I've been trying to treat the word "taste" more literally - like my taste in food, it's not supposed to be what anyone else wants me to eat; it's what *I* like that matters most of all. Different people think different things go together, have different favourites and dislikes (some of which are grounded in learned prejudice, while others are entirely arbitrary) and people can be incredibly judgemental about it, but you'll enjoy food more if you focus on and prioritise your own sensory experience over what you've been taught you *should* like. So it is with fashion taste.
Obviously the onus shouldn't all be on the individual, but it feels good to reclaim a bit of that power and put yourself first.
Yes to reclaiming the power of sensory experience! It's impossible to completely separate the personal experience from the larger, societal concept of taste, but I also feel that it's worth the effort to experiment. Learned prejudice and arbitrary likes and dislikes can be investigated and explored, and good things can come out of that.
How wonderfully you've broken down your style trajectory! It'll give me plenty to mull about this weekend...
I really like how you've taken a very nuanced approach to considering taste, both the dark side (its associations with hierarchy) and it's upside (cultural exploration!). I suppose for me it feels very loaded with the "dark" side, because coming from Asia, there was a lot of aspiration towards "western" society (not just aesthetics but even the values of a "western" democracy) and I'm still personally unlearning some of the things I internalised that made me devalue what I grew up with. What you wrote reminded me that we can hold all these ambiguities at once and still explore what we like, and why.
Thank you, Lin!
That's really interesting re: the cultural connotations of taste, aesthetics and values. I'd love to hear/read about it more. I've been going down the rabbit hole recently, investigating traditional clothing and costumes of various parts of the world, and how cultural colonization wiped them all away in what feels like a blink of an eye.
I find that I'm quite preoccupied with the dark side of taste as well. Coming from a lower middle class background and having one parent who was preoccupied with climbing the career ladder in order to pass for someone who has taste and to achieve the material goods associated with the upper middle class... well, there's been a lot of unlearning for me to do, as well.
Also, I think Stage 3 “Consumerism” of your exercise is a very normal component but it’s difficult played out over social media channels (ie hauls, SHEIN, etc). Reading this made me realize, Gen Z/ Alpha will, too, grow out of it too!
I hope they do, too! It's terrifying that young people grow up in this type of environment where they are taught to mindlessly consume, and of course it's much worse these days because fast fashion is so much, well, faster, than it used to be. It troubles me that the tenets of fast fashion (essentially, that clothes should be cheap and disposable) trickle down to the older generations as well. In my discussions with my older customers I hear them complain about poor quality in modern clothes all the time, but they still keep insisting that clothes should be cheap. I hear this at my shop at least once a week, and it's very discouraging. It's like the lessons these people have learned over the years have been sidelined by fast fashion propaganda. But maybe there's hope in the younger generations!
This!! I just finished trying to verbalize the mindset shift I’m trying to make from the previous “more is better” mindset that developed in my 20s. I am learning to spend more to get better even if that means my purchasing power decreases.
Yeah, I'm still learning, too, after all this time. It's a tough habit to break.
“Taste involves critical judgment and hierarchy. What follows is that you simply can’t discuss taste without the concept of class.” I’m grateful for your mention of this and I’ve bookmarked Kara’s newsletter to read. Jesica Elise has also delved into this side of the conversation with her knowledge and candor!
My brain has a hard time with this unless I differentiate between “good taste”, which is one thing, the very classist, normative thing, and “personal taste”, which is something else entirely, that we all have innately, though some give it more thought and turn it into something very refined and others go at it more intuitively and without paying a lot of attention. I don’t know. But I do think thrifting is an amazing way to develop your personal taste because you’re faced with so many varied choices and you have no other way of going about it but making strong decisions and creating personal taste formulas that work for you.
Lori, you have perfectly and very simply expressed what I wanted to say: this is about good taste vs personal taste. The problem with the Ezra Klein podcast episode and a lot of the conversations that followed (not to mention Rachel Tashjian's writing on the topic of taste that came before the Ezra Klein podcast) failed to make the distinction. I don't think the two can be separated, but certainly investigated.
I agree that thrifting is a great way to explore personal taste. I hate how thrift stores are becoming more and more "curated" or "styled" according to trends in Helsinki, because it takes away the pleasure of just letting the eye wander.
Absolutely loved the idea of using stages to understand the trajectory of your personal taste!
Thank you, Patty!
So good!