We’re all storytellers, whether we think of ourselves that way or not. Shameena believes that the clothes have power over our mind! The clothes we wear can capture memories and feelings. Her relationship with fashion changed when she realised the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom. From the fashion boredom a craving to express the self-hood blossomed! Here she tells us about following the fashion trends to blossoming into expressing self-hood. We are introducing fashion columnist, Malayasia-based fashionista, Shameena, from this week, exclusively in Different Truths.
What you wear is how you present yourself to the world, especially today, when human contacts are so quick. Fashion is instant language. —Miuccia Prada
To some, fashion is an art form. To others, it is almost like a religion. For most people though, fashion is a method of utilising clothing, accessories and grooming to show or hide something about yourself. Fashion can be an extension of your personality, allowing you to introduce parts of your personality to the world, without saying a word.
Let me take you along my journey through fashion.
I’ve always loved fashion, ever since I was little. I was born and brought up in India. Mumbai is considered a fashion capital of the county, where the society ladies ape the Mumbai look or copy Bollywood trends! As a child my only understanding about fashion was from pictures featured in the Bollywood Movie magazines and Movies. Any outfit adorned by an actor or actress in a hit movie immediately becomes a prime sartorial trend for women in my society. But sourcing the right material and experienced tailors to reproduce such trend was often a failure. Hence, ready-made industry was the only source for women in our society. Readymade shops sold these clothes in bulk and named them after the character or movies. One of the earliest movie influences on Indian fashion was Madhubala’s Anarkali attire in Mughal-e- Azam (1960), which consisted of long flowing churidars and kurtas. The Anarkali kameez is popular even today, around 50 years after the film was released.
Everyone wore Anarkali! You could see it everywhere in same cut and pattern! It became a fad in fashion. After certain period of time Anarkali became a boring attire and women craved for next upcoming hit movie!
I noticed not every woman fitted into Anarkali properly due to their body-shapes and all their effort and money had been wasted. To be frank, when Anarkali was in trend, even I wore it.
Because wearing Anarkali was a fashion status quo. Wearing other than that attire was considered like a wrong-doing. It created certain amount of pressure to fit in or pander the accumulated mind-set of fashion trend among society or peer group.
We’re all storytellers, whether we think of ourselves that way or not. I believe the clothes have power over our mind! The clothes we wear can capture memories and feelings. My relationship with fashion change when I realised the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom. From the fashion boredom a craving to express the self-hood blossomed!
What is your story about fashion? What is fashion to you? Are you a victim of similar fashion trend? Do you wear clothes to express yourself or it is simply about fashion trend? Is it something else altogether different?
To me,
Fashion is an expression of one’s inner self and not a reflection of every one’s expectation of what should be expressed. Nothing is as refreshing as seeing someone walk down the street in their own little world of awesomeness! When we stand out with our “self-hood”, we are no longer a slave to what the trend pages say! “Always wear what you want to wear” – I emphasis this quote everywhere at my work. Express self-hood with your genuine uniqueness to inspire others.
Have you ever wondered why and how clothes and personality are linked? What’s the connection between the two?
How we present ourselves to the world is a clear and often remarkably forthright reflection of who we are or who we want to be. What you wear says a lot about you! Who you are, what we believe and where we come from.
What goes on inside each individual’s psyche is carefully hidden behind ego defences, habitual behaviours, and socially dictated norms. The way we dress and style indicates an individual’s personality, self-image and at times, even his or her world view. In every sense of the word, we ‘dress to impress’, to make a statement to the world about who we are and how we want the world to see us. Nevertheless, it is a good idea to occasionally step back and look at our clothes and personality and how others see us through those; hopefully, we can learn something about ourselves in the process of as well.
In my styling class, I always emphasis “self-hood”. The first step towards self-hood is to learn to love yourself. What exactly does this phrase mean and how do you accomplish it? How is it linked with clothing? Stay tune with my upcoming articles in Different Truths.
©Shameena Abdurahiman
Photos sourced by the author.
#FashionFunda #Fashion #StyleAndFashion #LearningFashion #ExperiencingFashion #StylesFromMoveis #DifferentTruths
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