Don’t look back! You’re going the other way!

I always thought that ‘retro', was an abbreviation of retrospective, which is defined by Collins as, “feelings or opinions concerning things that have happened in the past.” Yet Merriam’s Dictionary defines ‘retro’ as being, “relating to, reviving, or being the styles and especially the fashions of the past: Fashionably nostalgic or old-fashioned.” There is quite a gap between the two don’t you think?

I mean, it’s not beyond the bounds of possibility for one word to have multiple meanings though, is it? After all, an article can be identified as “a published piece of writing'', a thing, “a particular item or object'', “a clause in a legal document'', or even as a figure of speech in grammar, being ‘a’ or ‘an', the indefinite articles, or ‘the', the definite article. It’s enough to do your head in, isn’t it?

But back to retro, in the sense of fashion. Is it really a new form of fashion, or is it a retail industry inspired fad, a craze, a practice, a pseudo-enthusiastic, zealous addiction to an intense and short-lived whimsy, or is it a cyclical, regenerative, reminder that class is permanent, and appeal is the root of all discretionary spending, whatever the environment. ‘On’ magazine says that “it’s no secret that fashion is cyclical and old trends do come back in style.”

Certainly, the ‘retro’ retail industry has been one that continues to emerge and re-emerge, with particularly clothing fashionistas leading us to believe that Audrey Hepburn’s gamine little black dress, Jane Seymour’s Doctor Quinn Prairie Dresses, Marilyn Monroe’s floaty florals, Mary Quant’s miniskirts, Britney Spears’ bubble-gum pop-tops, Abba’s flared trousers, Mike Nesmith’s turtlenecks, the Beatles’ mod look, James Dean’s jeans, Freddy Mercury’s leather pants, Jimi Hendrix chic hippy, Jack Kerouac’s beatnik beret, Lolita’s sunglasses, and vests, formerly known as waistcoats.

The fashion industry continually bombards us with messages harking back to the greatness, the sophistication and the ‘timeless nature', of retro clothing and fashions, making us believe that old really is the new new, and isn’t there some irony in that? For the life of me, apart from James Dean’s jeans, I can’t see that anything very much of the others merits any wardrobe space, though I’m reminded of the vintage poster I saw, saying “I hate to spend money on shoes, purses, jewellery and dresses, but the economy needs me.” You gotta smile!

Beautiful womenfolk and hunky menfolk will always look good, whether in the latest fashion or sackcloth and ashes (as they say), but fashion should be for all of us, all shapes and sizes, because honestly, how many of us are of a physical status that transcends the need for trendy gear? Hepburn herself commented that “Elegance is the only beauty that never fades'', confirming that class is not only absolute, but permanent, and Yves Saint Laurent, who rarely bothered with looking backwards, insisted that it is “fashion that fades, while style is eternal.”

More than second-hand clothes much of today’s retro offering appears to be more popular, but that is the crunch! Celebrities, influencers, and the ‘in-crowd,’ are pushing and shoving their way into the media to flaunt their retro look with some sort of divine right, yet they rarely say how they are being paid to wear it and talk about it. It’s just manipulating the consumer, and usually the weakest, most impressionable... those who can least afford it, and the expense of boosting the retro fashion market and demonstrating some allusion to modernity, in a morally bankrupt fashion, and maybe that’s not the word to be using.

Everybody loves a good comeback, but retro is a no-no. Why don’t we just commit retro fashion to Room 101, be like the iconic Coco Chanel and “don’t do fashion, be fashion!”