Who Dictates Your Style?

The streets in New York are teeming with wide-eyed merchants and waif bodies acting as harbingers of the latest dos. The occasional celebrity sighting and a chorus of scattered banter provide the appropriate backdrop only to be punctuated by know it all “trendies” waiting in line for the next big thing — eager to be among the firsts.

In the midst of this cathedral of hipness lies the Apple store, its location meant to tap into the cache of its zip code while doubling as a hideout and spiritual oasis for modern geeks who pay hesitant attention to the perennial fashion week.

The Apple store in a glaring attempt to engage the everyman, left the “Station A” sign on its façade. The store was once a post office. This virtual command center of gilded technology serves a diametric purpose — a sort of respite for those who think Louboutin is a search engine.

But if you look closely at the store, it too is a meeting place for those in the know, a facilitator of the unseeming marriage between fashion and technology. A destination, where the latest Eastern European runway sensation can pick up her new iSomething in engineered obscurity, flats, the obligatory sunglasses and Grace Kelly scarf.

With all this stored in its invisible corporate hardrive, Apple has introduced the wireless keyboard, which claims to use 24 percent less desktop space than the standard Apple keyboard. This may be a big deal to our minimalist side but irrelevant to those of us who enjoy using the numeric keypad and other document navigation controls found on your traditional keyboard. Yet much like 2010’s “it color” — metallic, you will need to ask one of the always cheerful associates clerk to dig up this old keyboard.

“Apple’s actually moving away from the original style and soon everyone will be using the new version, making the version you’re asking or obsolete.” -Apple Genius.

Just like that three men you may never meet, Mr. Jobs, Mr. Schiller and Mr. Johnson have dictated a preference or a style that many will adhere to. Is no place safe from “The Trend?” If you measure things in “Apple Time,” that 6-month-old iMac you bought your little brother may be only good for parts and an anthropology exhibit. This rush of technology begs a deeper question. Are we all in some aspects of our lives ruled by style mandates? An insatiable urge to lap up the newest anything that sails through our bloated consumer psyche. Furthermore, who dictates your style?

In order to answer any of these questions you must consider the paradoxical relationship and distinction between style and fashion. In the 1600s, when couturiers, looking to increase revenue began to replicate and mass produce versions of original bespoke gowns, to be sold to the general population, style suffered a major set back. The original dress was designed the previous season to fit the preferences of one notable woman and the general population could now imitate her style for less. An ancient H&M if you will. At its inception, the fashion industry and its stepchild, the trend, were predicated on the style of the aristocracy and since then, little has changed. If it’s safe to say that style is influenced by what one sees, hears or feels, then we might be at risk for expressing someone else’s life story through our “style” or lack there of. Perhaps, the problem lies with the talented 10th approach that the fashion industry approaches the dissemination of “top” fashion designers. They choose 10 percent of quite a large pool of designers and tell the rest of us, who will never see the other 90 percent, that this group is the best.

As the saying goes there are no new ideas — and the same holds true with style. In today’s world there is an endless supply of stimuli to inspire your personal style. But none is stronger that the inspiration we get from watching each other. The trick is to apply our own interpretation and let the world be your muse instead of becoming a carbon copy of what we see. This simple tip will ensure that your style is based on your interpretations and that your knee jerk response is “me” the next time someone asks – WHO DICTATES YOUR STYLE?