Adventures in Peacocking
So it was fashion week last week and as we all know, fashion week calls for some serious fashion-ing. In the weeks leading up to the event fashionistas’ across the country were engaging in the age-old activity of impulse shopping. Or as one friend put it, “buying completely beautiful but impractical pieces that you will only ever wear once.”
Why do we do this you may ask? Why did I just purchase that crazy printed, see-through maxi dress or that jacquard crop top? Because, to paraphrase Cady Heron, NZFW is the one time a year that a girl (or guy) can dress like a total clown and no one can say anything about it.
In fact clowning, otherwise known as peacocking, is encouraged. Encouraged by the presence Street Style photographers and bloggers on the hunt for the freshest looks, by the fact that fashion week is as much about being seen as it is about seeing and of course by the notion, if your not photographed you don’t exist.
For a while there I wondered if New Zealand really cared about this kind of thing, you know, to the same extent New York or Paris does. There are hardly swarms of photographers outside NZFW (thank god) and anyway, NZ is more into the laidback vibe right?
Wrong.
On the first day of NZFW I decided to go casual in jeans, a t-shirt, virtually no makeup and a non-label bag. When I arrived I found Amber who looked stunning, as per, in the below outfit. We hadn’t been there two minutes before someone came up to us and pointedly asked Amber if she could take her photograph. Literally she pointed directly (and vigorously) at Amber as if she was afraid Id get the idea she wanted me in there as well. She needn’t have worried I knew my jeans and t-shirt combo did not make the cut.
On the last day, after many photo rejections I thought I might as well try my hand at this peacocking business because, you know, if there is no photo evidence I might as well have not been there and I wasn’t about to waste an entire week.
That day I wore an outfit that I would probably never wear in any other setting:
I was cold, freezing in fact, and I felt like a bit of a phony but still, it got me photographed, multiple times too. Hurrah! I exist, therefore I am. Validation is a beautiful thing.
But don’t get me wrong even though I am kind of taking the piss, I’m not saying there is anything inherently wrong with peacocking. We all want our fifteen minutes or in this case, our 15 frames; I’m not immune to it, I want to feel appreciated just as much as the next person. I mean, fashion is a form of self-expression right so if you want to express yourself a little louder during fashion week then shit, go for it. Just be real about it. If your style is one that gets you photographed outside the shows then great but if you’re a jeans and t-shirt girl and you force yourself into sequin tights and a top hat just to get noticed… Well that’s just boring.
.
That’s my two cents. Lucy Korn
NB: Also if it’s your job to peacock then that’s cool too.
