Fashion is a very funny business. On the one hand, there is something new out there almost every few days, and to look at one season versus another you might actually be hard pressed to identify any particular pattern to bind an era together with the rest of its component parts. But by the same token, the fact of the matter is that fashion is also something which remains the same, year after year and generation after generation. After all, there are only so many different types of fabric, and with the exception of new brands, there are only so many different ways that thread is likely to be used in the construction of people’s clothing. With this being the case, it begs the question of just how many different types of styles there actually are in the fashion world, considering that most of the differences are extremely subtle ones known only to the more elite fashionistas.
Simply put, there are a lot of different components to anyone’s wardrobe. You have outerwear and innerwear, as well as several different levels of dress. While the rules of dressing up and down are a lot less formal and rigid than they were in generations past, there are still plenty of subtle levels between the most extreme levels of “painting the house or doing yard work” and “getting married or going to a major affair of state.” While the devil is always going to be in the details, fashions are always going to emphasize certain things, no matter what the broader look may be.
Every type of fashion is going to emphasize the overall power and social status of the person who wears it. While some people do this with lots of details, and some do so with bright colors, and some do this in still other ways, everybody who cares about fashion is out to show their superiority. When it comes to dressing to impress, the main differentiator when fashion and style come together is whether this person will dress this way in twenty years. Fashion fades, but personal style lasts forever.