Fashion tips every celebrity should know

Fashion should be personal. And if this is the case, who sets the rules? Should it be the person wearing the fashion? In most cases, the person exercises the least power over his own fashion.

When one can afford to buy the branded lines — he follows the rules of the big fashion houses.

When one has access to magazines and newspapers and television — he follows the rules of style written by various fashion movers and shakers.

When one cannot afford the cost of fashion — he follows the rules of necessity.

When one follows fashion rules — whatever they are — they are called stylish and elegant. In this department there is excessive praise for class and subdued/quiet elegance. What it is, only Giorgio, Helmut and the devil know.

When one plays around these rules — you become a pathetic fashion victim.

When one does not fall into the geometrical fashion equation of Miranda Priestly, you are baduy.

When one declares insanity and wears what one hates to wear but loves it when everyone hates it — he is declared a fashion deviant.

This litany can go on and on and on.

And it’s hilarious because purveyors of taste and elegance will be the first people to say that they celebrate individuality but in fact ignore the uniqueness of people. For if this is not the case, why is that little black dress so important to a woman’s wardrobe? Why not deftly-sewn banana leaves and ferns that I find behind our house by the side of a dead creek be in someone’s wardrobe? Why does one have to dress up like everyone? Best dressed? On what grounds? Worst dressed? What are the criteria?

But I don’t even want to get into fashion in general terms. I want to dissect showbiz fashion precisely because this is the world I’m familiar with. This is my world.

The following are random, unfashionable thoughts about showbiz fashion.

Movie and television stars. They are meant to twinkle brightly in the sky.

There’s nothing wrong about a well-cut black gown a star wears to an awards night. But to say that it is the only way to be showbiz — elegance is perverse.

I am in the belief that stars have the right to be stars. They should not be mistaken for jet-set socialites who can afford to follow the dizzying fashion pace as dictated by gigantic fashion houses in the world. And class in society circles must not be imposed on a moviestar who has a very different public and a very different pocket. Taste should be democratic.

I dread the idea that most people wear to society events define the universal standard of elegance and class. 

Television and moviestars, I think, should wear more colors, more experimental designs, fearless cuts, color combinations that should scandalize society belles. If construction is a big issue — moviestars should deconstruct. Anything but look like “classy” ladies and gentlemen who party with food cooked by American/European trained chefs and drinks sponsored by big wine houses I cannot even pronounce. I think it’s criminal to even suggest that moviestars dress up like socialites because they are two different sets of people. Even Hollywood has succumbed to this fashion mess. Everyone is “elegant” in Armanis and De la Rentas on the red carpet. Why can’t a moviestar be obnoxiously dressed in a rainbow of warring colors. Afterall she/he is a citizen of a world where actors (in movies) can be monsters, angels, prostitutes, presidents, spiders. Do wealthy socialites go through these various personas and worlds?

The by-product of “style and class” is boredom. And repression of the right to be unfashionable and the joy to be unreal in a very real world — even if most of the time it’s the other way around.