As I sit and contemplate my picks for New York and London Fashion weeks that have just passed, I started to wonder what was the point of reviewing them. Before the digital revolution, reviews were left to fashion editors and journalists to dictate what the next trends would be and bank on the hopes that consumers would heed to their suggestions. There was nothing else to bridge consumers to fashion except by glossies and advertisement, so it was natural to follow the wise words of fashion editors.

No longer.

Today, everyone has access to the collections literally on the spot or the day after at the latest. They can browse thousands of online stores, and use the likes of Polyvore, blogs, eBay, Etsy and websites, they can edit their own picks for trends, ideas and themes. Robin Givhan commented once that everyone is a fashion critic, my reply to her would be: what are they really criticizing? Certainly glossies these days don’t really devote much space to criticism save for the occasional professional who offers some original insight on the industry. But ultimately, the consumers have the power to choose to buy or not to buy, and with the internet, they’re relying less on fashion editors’ opinions and more on look books and product placement. Is it any wonder that fashion editors have little opinion to say these days?

Perhaps I’m understanding the word “review” in a different context. A review can mean many things, but my assumption in the context of fashion would be to actually create judgement based on observations made on a particular subject. Like a movie review, or an album review. But in the fashion context, it seems to be more on the lines of a “recap”. No person does a better recap than Ms. Hilary Alexander of The Telegraph UK. Her words are like straight out of a romance novel, rich, colorful and wildly imaginative. Now there’s a person whom I wouldn’t mind reading her “reviews”. But if you want something with more insight to the collections (not based on press kits alone), then you need someone who has their bodies knee deep in the arts and culture of the world. Of course, even the experts have their own opinions and sometimes give biased reviews on their favorite designers. But that beckons the question: what exactly are they looking for in a collection? What makes them go “Wow!”? Is it the overall feel of the collection? The theme? The fabrics? The patterns? The silhouettes? The history of the brand? Or a combination of all?

Cathy Horyn recently blogged how she praised the Fendi collection because it “hovered above the fray,” yet I couldn’t particularly see anything of interest save fore a few nice dresses. And Helene, of The Luxe Chronicles, once asked me “Is the world running out of pretty dresses?” Do we really need another collection of pretty dresses? Perhaps the Fendi collection appealed to an older generation. Yet I’m nearing my 30s, I’ll soon be among the demographic of those who can supposedly fit into these looks. Perhaps I’m simply not a Fendi woman. It’s difficult to find useful information in the text descriptions of the outfits – despite the images of the show being posted right next to the text (or on Style.com). In the era of Twitter, it is only during the live shows are text descriptions useful, even then they are of value only to the minute.

Trends can emerge, but do we really want to fall into trends when everyone is trying to style themselves away from trends? There seems to be an unwritten rule that if it’s the trend, then you better stay away from it.

My thoughts in reviewing a show are more along the lines of:

“Are these going to sell?”
“What kind of woman was this collection aimed for?”
“Is it aesthetically interesting or are the cuts interesting?”
“Is there a concept to the presentation of the show? the format?”

So my suggestion to you, fellow readers, you want a recap? Go to Ms. Alexander. You want a look book? Go back to your glossies. You want a review? Go to Ms. Horyn or Ms. Menkes (or me, on the certain occasion). Everything else can be filtered as fluff.

Seldom do we come across thought-provoking articles on fashion, and when we do, like fashions during the season, they come and go. Yet there is a wealth of well-written articles floating in cyberspace, yet none collected in a single area. These fashion reports contain gems of fashion insight of the leading fashion experts around the world. And by fashion expert, I do mean a well-researched and seasoned fashion journalist, not trend or style specialists.

One particularly “old” video interview of Cathy Horyn by Coutorture foresaw the influence of fashion bloggers and that she herself would soon emerge as a top fashion blogger in her own right.

I have a penchant for researching things on the internet, and reading up about details. I found it incredibly difficult to sift through the wealth of information that surrounds the internet about fashion. Fashion blogging hasn’t been around that long, but the rate of posts every day is immeasurable by my own account, and print publications such as newspapers and magazines have backlogs of it dating back to over 150 years. I have yet to read any works by the late Diana Vreeland, an influential fashion editor, since the prints are probably archived in a warehouse but not online.

Needless to say, we should not forget these articles, they can be of great use to many budding fashion journalists who might want to take a different approach. And perhaps a future book publication, but I digress.

I offer you a new section at Dualité called “Resources” and within it will be “Insights” a growing list of fascinating articles I’ve collected over the years. I have no doubt this will grow into a big archive of select articles, but it’s really worth reading. I highly recommend.

Image credit: Sony Vaio

The Wall Street Journal was rather cocky about the release of their new lifestyle magazine, WSJ. (with the period) last week, taking slight swipes at their competitions like T Magazine from The New York Times.

After some reflections and analyzing e-magazines, I’m starting to wonder if e-magazines really offer you a different web experience or are they really just spruced up versions of their printed counterparts? We’re now expecting more and more from fashion websites, we want them to be updated daily, we want RSS feeds, we want comment capabilities, forums, and tons of pictures and videos to look at.

Unfortunately, I don’t understand why big reputable newspaper companies such as the WSJ and NY Times cannot afford to give its magazines the same web usability as their newspapers. Granted, these magazines only publish monthly or quarterly, but I believe the extra online features should be added.

Here are some of things lacking from WSJ.

• No comment feature – Are we not allowed to have dialogue in the luxury world?
• Only one RSS Feed of a blog-ish type of daily update called “WSJ. Magazine Today”, of which a couple of the articles don’t show up in the feed, or a few appear in the feed but not on the same page of the site? Where are you pulling your posts WSJ.?
• Videos – Ok. I’m going to rip this apart. What is up with their videos?? I really like Roland Mouret and his interview “The Shape of Things To Come” is a good read. But the videos on this site are little more than decorative and have little to say. I usually like WSJ’s reporting videos on the newspaper’s site, even if they do lack pizzazz. These videos’ intros sound off to the beat of something coming off of MTV’s Cribs. On top of that, you can’t even share the video, not that they’d be worth it… Is this really luxury? I’m not even rich but I know crap when I see it.

I’ve revisited T Magazine’s site and also found a few gripes.

• No comment feature – except for their blog “In The Moment” which I’m starting to believe is really a blog post overload of anything fashion related. Hardly anybody comments.
• RSS only for “In The Moment”, so you’d have to scroll through a maze of articles on the site itself.
• Videos are non-linkable, non-adjustable, and a tad too small for my taste (make it YouTube size at least). I like their “Screen Test” series, and can find a few gems in “Exclusive Films”, but I would do away with “T Takes” of short films, they don’t belong on this site.

I’m split between what e-magazines today should represent. As a print publication, it’s obvious we’re only doing the reading and there’s no interaction whatsoever between the content and yourself. But as a web experience, especially seeing how interaction is now possible between the content and the user, I’ve come to expect this extra feature to be available for online publications (whether they have printed counterparts or not). I suppose magazines don’t want to lose their authority on fashion, and open the gates to dialogue will expose them to direct, unfiltered critique of their content. But so far I think being able to comment and share content has only heightened the interest in fashion and we could get some very insightful opinions from individuals you wouldn’t never hear about. Cathy Horyn’s “On The Runway” blog is a prime example of being able to voice her opinions, and still be respected and receive both favorable or unfavorable opinions from different users. This interaction shouldn’t be ignored and for the fashion industry, reknown as a tough skin industry, to shrivel up so easily to opinionated consumers is sort of an oxymoron.

Now here’s a channel that I really love watching and am glad that they’re not entirely superficial on the subject of fashion. Fashion Television made a report on Fashion Journalism and asked chief editors and real fashion journalists of their opinion on journalism within their industry.

It’s a fantastic clip and I’m glad that Jeanne Becker took on this bit and interviewed several people in the industry. Among fashion journalists we should look up to is Cathy Horyn from The New York Times, Suzy Menkes from the International Herald Tribune, and Michael Gross who currently writes for several publications. I just thought I would share this with everyone, it may be an old clip, but it’s still very much relevant today.

Yet museums go hand in hand with the history of fashion, archiving the greatest works of past designers and exhibiting its evolution throughout the years. It’s surprising since museums don’t exactly convey to be such a hip and happening place, yet some of the most interesting fashion collaborations have happened there in the last couple of years. Most notably Louis Vuitton for boldly opening a store within the Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA) in Los Angeles last year.

Alexander McQueen’s oyster dress, Spring/Summer 2003

blog.mode is still relatively new, operating since December 2007, it has already garnered quite a following. True to its museum-like self, the blog exhibits a one photo piece with accompanying historical text as if you were reading the small square text on a wall next to the work itself. I think this is a great way to learn about the history of fashion and reading the responses from other readers and their thoughts on the pieces presented. The blog.mode event will be held March 30th at 3pm. I’m starting to believe that I will have to make trips to the Big Apple a little more often!

This is another great step for bringing people around the world to chat about fashion, in virtual museum space. I really like this idea, and find it quite fantastic of bringing everyone along in the conversation. I urge you to check it out!

Image credit: blog.mode of the Metropolitan Museum of Art