The 2015 Spring Fashion Trends We're Most Excited About - Huffington Post Canada

LONDON, ENGLAND - SEPTEMBER 15: A model walks the runway at the Erdem Spring Summer 2015 fashion show during London Fashion Week on September 15, 2014 in London, United Kingdom. (Photo by Catwalking/Getty Images)

LONDON, ENGLAND - SEPTEMBER 16: A model walks the runway at the Simone Rocha Spring Summer 2015 fashion show during London Fashion Week on September 16, 2014 in London, United Kingdom. (Photo by Catwalking/Getty Images)

A model wears a creation for Saint Laurent's Spring/Summer 2015 ready-to-wear fashion collection presented in Paris, France, Monday, Sept. 29, 2014. (AP Photo/Francois Mori)

PARIS, FRANCE - SEPTEMBER 29: A model walks the runway during the Saint Laurent show as part of the Paris Fashion Week Womenswear Spring/Summer 2015 on September 29, 2014 in Paris, France. (Photo by Antonio de Moraes Barros Filho/WireImage)

PARIS, FRANCE - SEPTEMBER 29: A model walks the runway at the Saint Laurent Spring Summer 2015 fashion show during Paris Fashion Week on September 29, 2014 in Paris, France. (Photo by Catwalking/Getty Images)

PARIS, FRANCE - SEPTEMBER 26: A model walks the runway at the Isabel Marant Spring Summer 2015 fashion show during Paris Fashion Week on September 26, 2014 in Paris, France. (Photo by Catwalking/Getty Images)

PARIS, FRANCE - SEPTEMBER 26: A model presents a creation by Isabel Marant during the 2015 Spring/Summer ready-to-wear collection fashion show, on September 26, 2014 in Paris, France. (Photo by Thierry Chesnot/Getty Images)

NEW YORK, NY - SEPTEMBER 06: A Model walks the runway at the Tibi runway show during Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Spring 2015 at the Highline Stages on September 6, 2014 in New York City. (Photo by Albert Urso/Getty Images)

NEW YORK, NY - SEPTEMBER 06: Camille is seen outside the Tibi show wearing Balenciaga top, Tibi skirt, Celine Bag, and Jimmy Choo flats on September 6, 2014 in New York City. (Photo by Daniel Zuchnik/Getty Images)

NEW YORK, NY - SEPTEMBER 06: Margaret Zhang is seen outside the Tibi show wearing Illesteva sunglasses, a Dion Lee top, Elizabeth & James bag, Tibi jacket, Jil Sander skirt, and Mode Collective shoes on September 6, 2014 in New York City. (Photo by Daniel Zuchnik/Getty Images)

The Ralph Lauren Spring 2015 collection is modeled during Fashion Week, in New York, Thursday, Sept. 11, 2014. (AP Photo/Richard Drew)

PARIS, FRANCE - SEPTEMBER 27: A model walks the runway at the Acne Studios Spring Summer 2015 fashion show during Paris Fashion Week on September 27, 2014 in Paris, France. (Photo by Catwalking/Getty Images)

The Alexander Wang Spring 2015 collection is modeled during Fashion Week, Saturday, Sept. 6, 2014, in New York. (AP Photo/John Minchillo)

NEW YORK, NY - SEPTEMBER 06: A model walks the runway at Alexander Wang during Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Spring 2015>> at Pier 94 on September 6, 2014 in New York City. (Photo by Thomas Concordia/WireImage)

MILAN, ITALY - SEPTEMBER 17: A model walks the runway at the Gucci Spring Summer 2015 fashion show during Milan Fashion Week on September 17, 2014 in Milan, Italy. (Photo by Catwalking/Getty Images)

A model wears a creation for Gucci women's spring-summer 2015 collection, part of the Milan Fashion Week, unveiled in Milan, Italy, Wednesday, Sept. 17, 2014. (AP Photo/Luca Bruno)

MILAN, ITALY - SEPTEMBER 17: A model walks the runway at the Gucci Spring Summer 2015 fashion show during Milan Fashion Week on September 17, 2014 in Milan, Italy. (Photo by Catwalking/Getty Images)

NEW YORK, NY - SEPTEMBER 07: A model walks the runway during the Derek Lam show at Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Spring 2015 at Sean Kelly Gallery on September 7, 2014 in New York City. (Photo by Antonio de Moraes Barros Filho/FilmMagic)

NEW YORK, NY - SEPTEMBER 07: A model walks the runway at Derek Lam during Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Spring 2015 at Sean Kelly Gallery on September 7, 2014 in New York City. (Photo by Randy Brooke/WireImage)

The Marc by Marc Jacobs Spring 2015 collection is modeled during Fashion Week, Tuesday, Sept. 9, 2014, in New York. (AP Photo/Jason DeCrow)

The Rag & Bone Spring 2015 collection is modeled during Fashion Week, Monday, Sept. 8, 2014, in New York. (AP Photo/Jason DeCrow)

NEW YORK, NY - SEPTEMBER 09: A model walks the runway at the J.Crew Spring Summer 2015 fashion show during New York Fashion Week on September 9, 2014 in New York, United States. (Photo by Catwalking/Getty Images)

A model wears a creation for Louis Vuitton's Spring/Summer 2015 ready-to-wear fashion collection presented in Paris, France, Wednesday, Oct. 1, 2014. (AP Photo/Francois Mori)

A model wears a creation as part of Givenchy's Spring/Summer 2015 ready-to-wear fashion collection, presented in Paris, France, Sunday, Sept. 28, 2014.(AP Photo/Jacques Brinon)

Model Cara Delevingne wears a creation as part of Givenchy's Spring/Summer 2015 ready-to-wear fashion collection, presented in Paris, France, Sunday, Sept. 28, 2014.(AP Photo/Jacques Brinon)

NEW YORK, NY - SEPTEMBER 09: A model walks the runway at the Vera Wang Collection fashion show during Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Spring 2015 on September 9, 2014 in New York City. (Photo by Peter Michael Dills/Getty Images)

PARIS, FRANCE - SEPTEMBER 24: A model walks the runway at the Dries Van Noten Spring Summer 2015 fashion show during Paris Fashion Week on September 24, 2014 in Paris, France. (Photo by Catwalking/Getty Images)

In this image released by Starpix, Kendall Jenner models fashion from the Tommy Hilfiger Spring 2015 collection during Fashion Week on Monday, Sept. 8, 2014, in New York. (AP Photo/Starpix, Aurora Rose)

NEW YORK, NY - SEPTEMBER 08: A model walks the runway at the Tommy Hilfiger Spring Summer 2015 fashion show during New York Fashion Week on September 8, 2014 in New York, United States. (Photo by Catwalking/Getty Images)

A model wears a creation for Louis Vuitton's Spring/Summer 2015 ready-to-wear fashion collection presented in Paris, France, Wednesday, Oct. 1, 2014. (AP Photo/Francois Mori)

NEW YORK, NY - SEPTEMBER 09: A model walks the runway at the Oscar De La Renta fashion show during Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Spring 2015 on September 9, 2014 in New York City. (Photo by Slaven Vlasic/Getty Images)

PARIS, FRANCE - SEPTEMBER 30: A model walks the runway at the Chanel Spring Summer 2015 fashion show during Paris Fashion Week on September 30, 2014 in Paris, France. (Photo by Catwalking/Getty Images)

PARIS, FRANCE - SEPTEMBER 30: A model walks the runway during the Chanel show as part of the Paris Fashion Week Womenswear Spring/Summer 2015 on September 30, 2014 in Paris, France. (Photo by Antonio de Moraes Barros Filho/WireImage)

A model wears a creation for Marni women's Spring Summer 2015 collection, part of the Milan Fashion Week, unveiled in Milan, Italy, Sunday, Sept. 21, 2014. (AP Photo/Antonio Calanni)

PARIS, FRANCE - OCTOBER 01: A model walks the runway at the Miu Miu Spring Summer 2015 fashion show during Paris Fashion Week on October 1, 2014 in Paris, France. (Photo by Catwalking/Getty Images)

FILE - In this Thursday, Sept. 11, 2014, file photo, the Marc Jacobs Spring 2015 collection is modeled during Fashion Week in New York. (AP Photo/John Minchillo, File)

The Marc by Marc Jacobs Spring 2015 collection is modeled during Fashion Week, Tuesday, Sept. 9, 2014, in New York. (AP Photo/Jason DeCrow)

The Michael Kors Spring 2015 collection is modeled during Fashion Week, in New York, Wednesday, Sept. 10, 2014. (AP Photo/Richard Drew)

MILAN, ITALY - SEPTEMBER 18: A model walks the runway during the Ports 1961 show as a part of Milan Fashion Week Womenswear Spring/Summer 2015 on September 18, 2014 in Milan, Italy. (Photo by Antonio de Moraes Barros Filho/WireImage)

MILAN, ITALY - SEPTEMBER 18: Kendall Jenner walks the runwaz during the Ports1961 show as a part of Milan Fashion Week Womenswear Spring/Summer 2015 on September 18, 2014 in Milan, Italy. (Photo by Stefania D'Alessandro/Getty Images)

A model wears a creation for Roberto Cavalli women's spring-summer 2015 collection, part of the Milan Fashion Week, unveiled in Milan, Italy, Saturday, Sept. 20, 2014 (AP Photo/Giuseppe Aresu)

MILAN, ITALY - SEPTEMBER 20: A model walks the runway at the Roberto Cavalli Spring Summer 2015 fashion show during Milan Fashion Week on September 20, 2014 in Milan, Italy. (Photo by Catwalking/Getty Images)

MILAN, ITALY - SEPTEMBER 20: A model walks the runway during the Roberto Cavalli show as a part of Milan Fashion Week Womenswear Spring/Summer 2015 on September 20, 2014 in Milan, Italy. (Photo by Antonio de Moraes Barros Filho/WireImage)

NEW YORK, NY - SEPTEMBER 06: A model walks the runway at the Altuzarra show during Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Spring 2015 at Spring Studios on September 6, 2014 in New York City. (Photo by Thomas Concordia/WireImage)

Fashion from Peter Som Spring 2015 collection is modeled during Fashion Week on Friday, Sept. 5, 2014 in New York. (AP Photo/Bebeto Matthews)

Fashion from the Peter Som Spring 2015 collection is modeled during Fashion Week on Friday, Sept. 5, 2014 in New York. (AP Photo/Bebeto Matthews)

PARIS, FRANCE - SEPTEMBER 30: Leigh Lezark (shoe detail) attends the Chanel show as part of the Paris Fashion Week Womenswear Spring/Summer 2015 on September 30, 2014 in Paris, France. (Photo by Pascal Le Segretain/Getty Images)

PARIS, FRANCE - SEPTEMBER 30: Kiko Mizuhara (Shoe detail) attends the Chanel show as part of the Paris Fashion Week Womenswear Spring/Summer 201 on September 30, 2014 in Paris, France. (Photo by Pierre Suu/GC Images)

LONDON, ENGLAND - SEPTEMBER 13: A guest wearing Chanel Sneakers in the streets of London during London Fashion Week Spring Summer 2015 at on September 13, 2014 in London, England. (Photo by Timur Emek/Getty Images)

MILAN, ITALY - SEPTEMBER 21: A model walks the runway at the Dolce & Gabbana Spring Summer 2015 fashion show during Milan Fashion Week on September 21, 2014 in Milan, Italy. (Photo by Catwalking/Getty Images)

MILAN, ITALY - SEPTEMBER 21: A model walks the runway during the Dolce & Gabbana show as a part of Milan Fashion Week Womenswear Spring/Summer 2015 on September 21, 2014 in Milan, Italy. (Photo by Antonio de Moraes Barros Filho/WireImage)

MILAN, ITALY - SEPTEMBER 20: A model walks the runway at the Bottega Veneta Spring Summer 2015 fashion show during Milan Fashion Week on September 20, 2014 in Milan, Italy. (Photo by Catwalking/Getty Images)

PARIS, FRANCE - SEPTEMBER 28: A model walks the runway at the Chloe Spring Summer 2015 fashion show during Paris Fashion Week on September 28, 2014 in Paris, France. (Photo by Catwalking/Getty Images)

NEW YORK, NY - SEPTEMBER 08: Model Hilary Rhonda attends the Polo Ralph Lauren fashion show during Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Spring 2015 at Cherry Hill in Central Park on September 8, 2014 in New York City. (Photo by Craig Barritt/Getty Images)

NEW YORK, NY - SEPTEMBER 09: A model walks the runway at Tory Burch during Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Spring 2015 at Avery Fisher Hall, Lincoln Center on September 9, 2014 in New York City. (Photo by Edward James/WireImage)

A model wears a creation for Saint Laurent's Spring/Summer 2015 ready-to-wear fashion collection presented in Paris, France, Monday, Sept. 29, 2014. (AP Photo/Francois Mori)

MILAN, ITALY - SEPTEMBER 18: A model walks the runway during the Ports1961 show as a part of Milan Fashion Week Womenswear Spring/Summer 2015 on September 18, 2014 in Milan, Italy. (Photo by Stefania D'Alessandro/Getty Images)

A model wears a creation for Marni women's Spring Summer 2015 collection, part of the Milan Fashion Week, unveiled in Milan, Italy, Sunday, Sept. 21, 2014. (AP Photo/Antonio Calanni)

A model wears a creation for Valentino's Spring/Summer 2015 ready-to-wear fashion collection presented in Paris, France, Tuesday, Sept. 30, 2014. (AP Photo/Jacques Brinon)

NEW YORK, NY - SEPTEMBER 05: A model walks the runway at the Nonoo fashion show with TRESemme at Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Spring 2015 on September 5, 2014 in New York City. (Photo by Slaven Vlasic/Getty Images for TRESemme)

PARIS, FRANCE - SEPTEMBER 25: A model walks the runway at the Balmain Spring Summer 2015 fashion show during Paris Fashion Week on September 25, 2014 in Paris, France. (Photo by Catwalking/Getty Images)

PARIS, FRANCE - SEPTEMBER 25: Rosie Huntington-Whiteley walks the runway at the Balmain Spring Summer 2015 fashion show during Paris Fashion Week on September 25, 2014 in Paris, France. (Photo by Catwalking/Getty Images)

PARIS, FRANCE - SEPTEMBER 27: A model walks the runway at the Haider Ackermann Spring Summer 2015 fashion show during Paris Fashion Week on September 27, 2014 in Paris, France. (Photo by Catwalking/Getty Images)

PARIS, FRANCE - SEPTEMBER 30: A model walks the runway during the Valentino show as part of the Paris Fashion Week Womenswear Spring/Summer 2015 on September 30, 2014 in Paris, France. (Photo by Antonio de Moraes Barros Filho/WireImage)

PARIS, FRANCE - SEPTEMBER 30: A model walks the runway at the Valentino Spring Summer 2015 fashion show during Paris Fashion Week on September 30, 2014 in Paris, France. (Photo by Catwalking/Getty Images)

FILE - In this Monday, Sept. 8, 2014, file photo, fashion from the Donna Karan Spring 2015 collection is modeled during Fashion Week in New York. (AP Photo/Bebeto Matthews, File)

NEW YORK, NY - SEPTEMBER 08: A model walks the runway during the Donna Karan New York show during Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Spring 2015 at 547 West 26th Street on September 8, 2014 in New York City. (Photo by Antonio de Moraes Barros Filho/FilmMagic)

LONDON, ENGLAND - SEPTEMBER 13: A model walks the runway at the Holly Fulton show during London Fashion Week Spring Summer 2015 at Somerset House on September 13, 2014 in London, England. (Photo by Antonio de Moraes Barros Filho/WireImage)

A model wears a creation as part of Givenchy's Spring/Summer 2015 ready-to-wear fashion collection, presented in Paris, France, Sunday, Sept. 28, 2014.(AP Photo/Jacques Brinon)

A model wears a creation as part of Chloe's Spring/Summer 2015 ready-to-wear fashion collection, presented in Paris, France, Sunday, Sept. 28, 2014. (AP Photo/Jacques Brinon)

MILAN, ITALY - SEPTEMBER 18: A model walks the runway during the DSquared2 show as a part of Milan Fashion Week Womenswear Spring/Summer 2015 on September 18, 2014 in Milan, Italy. (Photo by Antonio de Moraes Barros Filho/WireImage)

NEW YORK, NY - SEPTEMBER 05: Accessory detail at the Kate Spade New York Presentation during Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Spring 2015 at Center 548 on September 5, 2014 in New York City. (Photo by Cindy Ord/Getty Images)

NEW YORK, NY - SEPTEMBER 05: Accessory detail at the Kate Spade New York Presentation duringMercedes-Benz Fashion Week Spring 2015 at Center 548 on September 5, 2014 in New York City. (Photo by Cindy Ord/Getty Images)

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Plus-Sized Fashion and the Sociologist's Gaze - Pacific Standard

Fashion is thin. Most directly, that means that the fashion industry privileges extremely slender bodies; average American women are size 10 to 14, while the average fashion model is a vanishing size zero to four. Because of this extremely limited range of body types, diversity, in every sense, is constricted.

In this context, plus-size modeling can be an act of resistance, as sociologist Amanda M. Czerniawski explains in her new book, Fashioning Fat: Inside Plus-Size Modeling . Czerniawski worked as a plus-sized model herself during her research. She also interviewed numerous other plus-sized models, who talk about their deliberate, politicized effort to change the fashion industry.

One size 16/18 model, Janice, spoke for many of those Czerniawski interviewed when she declared: “Despite all the problems in this industry, I’m rewarded for being myself. I’m grateful for there to be such an industry. I’m honored to take part in this field where I can potentially change minds about beauty.” Another model referred to the 300-pound, internationally recognized model Velvet D’Amour, who has walked the Paris fashion runways as “my plus-size superhero.” As Czerniawski writes, “contemporary American society discriminates against fat,” and even “fat” people often stereotype their peers as lazy. In that context, plus-sized models are making a statement when they show that a size 10, or a size 18, can be normal, sexy, exciting, desirable. Plus-sized models make fashion more diverse, more accepting, and less pinched.

“Women,” she argues—including plus-sized models—”experience their bodies as not solely for their pleasure and amusement but as under the constant gaze of others.”

Or at least, that’s the hope. Czerniawski, though, is not entirely convinced. Though plus-sized models want to change notions of beauty and glamour, she argues, the industry restricts their efforts and their effectiveness. Plus-sized models are not really all that free; though they do not have to be a size zero, their bodies are still regulated and policed. Women are frequently encouraged by their agents to lose weight, maintain their weight, or even, in some cases, to gain weight. Czerniawski herself, at a size 10, was considered too small for some modeling gigs, while being too big for “straight” non-plus-size modeling. And even after all that effort, plus-size models remain marginalized within an industry where “straight” models still get more opportunities, more gigs, more money, and more fame.

As a result of privileging the thin, Czerniawski argues, plus-size models in fashion shoots are encouraged to fit into images of sexiness and beauty that are derived from, or much the same as, those of the straight modeling world and its requirements. Akin to straight models, plus-sized models, she argues, have to distance themselves from their own bodies, privileging the gaze of the fashion industry over their own subjectivity. They must constantly monitor their weight, their appearance, and even their mood in order to get gigs. Models “change their bodies to fit a preexisting image of beauty rather than being empowered in a way that allows them to alter the image to fit their bodies,” Czerniawski argues. As a former actor, she was also disturbed by the extent to which modeling agencies cared only about photographs, and barely cared to interview her for jobs. “In acting I used my body and voice,” she writes. “In modeling I was voiceless.”

Czerniawski argues that plus-sized models still remain alienated objects, shaped by the industry’s gaze. I think she makes a convincing case—but I also think she ignores the way in which her own book rather helplessly parallels the same dynamic. She criticizes the way in which models in the industry become “voiceless dolls.” But at the same time, she, as sociologist and academic, overwrites her interviewees’ narratives of empowerment with her own more skeptical analysis. She criticizes the way in which models are alienated from their bodies and forced to undertake “self-surveillance.” But she mirrors that self-surveillance in her own account of her modeling work. On the runway, “The thrill of all the attention intoxicated me … I soaked in my moment. I felt fierce.” But she then insists that that fierceness was not authentic. She was “lost in the moment…. Under the spell” of a desire to look beautiful. She splits herself in two: the deluded self as a model, who cannot speak truth, and the knowing self as a sociologist, who analyzes, interprets, and breaks through delusion.

“Despite all the problems in this industry, I’m rewarded for being myself. I’m grateful for there to be such an industry. I’m honored to take part in this field where I can potentially change minds about beauty.”

Czerniawski even reproduces the economics of the industry. As she writes in her book, the plus-sized industry fetishizes and commodifies curves, breasts, rears, hips. “Women,” she argues—including plus-sized models—”experience their bodies as not solely for their pleasure and amusement but as under the constant gaze of others.” This is certainly true of the fashion industry. But it’s just as certainly the case for a sociological study of modeling, which is, inevitably, more interesting, and more marketable than it would be if it were focused on a less sexy topic. The breasts, the rears, the curves—they adorn Czerniawski’s study too, and confer their glamour upon it.

Many of the indignities that Czerniawski details—lack of benefits, arbitrary management decisions, exploitative contracts—are typical of many (most?) labor relationships under capitalism. They certainly sound familiar to me from friends who work in the ever-more-adjunctifying academy. In singling out plus-sized models as particularly exploited, or particularly victimized by false-consciousness, Czerniawski seems to be reinforcing the stigma she wants to combat. “Fat” women are sad, “fat” women are self-deluded; “fat” women are alienated from their bodies. That all sounds a bit too familiar.

This isn’t to say that Czerniawski is a hypocrite; it’s not even to say that she’s wrong. On the contrary, her book is, for the most part, honest, thoughtful, and insightful. But nonetheless, and despite her best efforts, sociology and plus-sized fashion remain eerily similar. Both can focus a gaze upon a deviant, marginalized population. Both usually profess to render that population visible and comprehensible, while basking in its edginess, glamour, and excitement. And, unless great care is taken, both can end up exoticizing and condescending the very people they claim to empower. Fashioning Fat tries, with some success, to create a more comprehensive vision of plus-size models and their world. It’s not Czerniawski’s fault if, in the end, her vision, like that of the industry she chronicles, feels too narrow.

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Ralph Lauren's Native American Ads Reveal Sad Truth About The Fashion World - Huffington Post

The clothing company Ralph Lauren released an online advertisement for its RRL line last month that drew scathing criticism from Native Americans.

The ad's imagery harked back to the Old West, with henley jerseys and rustic jeans displayed in faded sepia tones. And while one page touted bandanas and “Western-style” shirts, the opposite page showed a Native American sporting a feathered headdress, holding a rifle across his lap.

Another page depicted a stoic Native American man with dark skin, braided hair and a Western shirt-and-vest combo.

Critics charged that the ads reduced people, and indeed entire cultures, to mere marketing props. Many called for a boycott. Dr. Adrienne Keene, a postdoctoral researcher and citizen of the Cherokee Nation, wrote in a post for Indian Country Today Media Network that Ralph Lauren had reached a "new low."

“Ralph Lauren has been doing this my whole life,” Ruth Hopkins, a writer in her 30s who lives on the Spirit Lake Tribe reservation in North Dakota, told The Huffington Post. “He is a repeat offender. Cultural appropriation is apparently his thing.”

Following the outcry, the company removed the images from its website and apologized.

The episode neatly summed up an issue in fashion and pop culture that has drawn heated debate in recent years. Many people seemingly remain tethered to the idea of a romanticized Old West -- a time of death and carnage for America’s indigenous population.

The “cowboys and Indians” movies of the 1950s did much to solidify these tropes in modern American culture, building on centuries of stereotypes. These films mashed up the traditions of countless tribes indiscriminately, often depicting Native Americans as primitive, even bloodthirsty brutes. At best, indigenous people were depicted as noble savages, piteous characters not yet corrupted by the "civilized" world. Meanwhile, the real-life meanings attached to certain items, customs and historical figures got distorted or lost, and white Americans, for the most part, neither knew nor cared.

Model Karlie Kloss wearing a Native American headdress during the taping of the 2012 Victoria's Secret Fashion Show in New York. (Photo credit: AP/Starpix, Amanda Schwab)

Take the war bonnet, a feathered headdress worn by the warriors or leaders of many Native American tribes. Each feather was earned through a sacrifice or an act of valor, making the bonnet a mark of great respect. But at the 2012 Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show, supermodel Karlie Kloss strode down the catwalk in panties, a skimpy bra and a massive war bonnet-like headdress. Chanel put headdresses on the runway in 2013, and Pharrell Williams donned one on the cover of Elle UK in 2014. Each incident was met with swift backlash.

Such cliched images are what many Native Americans in the fashion industry want to transcend.

“Mass society thinks that way,” said Bethany Yellowtail, a 26-year-old fashion designer and member of the Crow and Northern Cheyenne tribes. “They think of teepees and headdresses and feathers.”

Raised in Montana on the Crow Indian Reservation, Yellowtail wants to bring authenticity to indigenous fashion with her line B.Yellowtail, which will be released in spring. Her clothes are modern takes on the classic designs of her culture, adapting the work of her ancestors to the 21st century -- for example, designs based on the beadwork of her great-grandmother, who lived in the 19th century.

“Our original designs were purposeful,” she said. “The colors, the designs -- everything has a specific meaning and a spirit connected to it.”

Bethany Yellowtail's "Old style floral elk tooth dress" on the runway at the Santa Fe Indian art market. (Image credit: Lehi Sanchez)

Patricia Michaels, a 48-year-old Native American fashion designer who appeared on Bravo’s "Project Runway" in 2013, told HuffPost that she doesn't consider it her place to police what people can or can't use in their designs. It should come down to thoughtfulness and taste, she said, adding that if the non-Native American designers who have gotten in trouble in the past had simply collaborated with Native American designers who know the culture, everyone would have benefited.

“I wouldn’t take the Pope’s hat and put it on the runway,” said Michaels, who is based in New Mexico. “I think that’s where taste comes in, as far as a designer. Do you really want to put a war bonnet on a female model? If you’re going to be distasteful and have no regard for somebody’s culture, it’s shameful.”

When Michaels describes her designs, it’s clear that everything has a meaning. Her “Elk Antler Cape” strives to portray the beauty and grace of indigenous hunters and the animals that give their lives. An “Ink Drip Top” on silk charmeuse represents contaminants invading once-pure waters. A flowing, hand-painted organza skirt symbolizes the years that Michaels' ancestors spent observing and preserving nature.

Patricia Michaels' hand-felted wool bag is an homage to Navajo weavers. (Image credit: curryimages)

Meanwhile, Ralph Lauren’s “Pawnee jacket” -- an item that appeared in the controversial RRL ads last month, and one that shares a name with a Midwestern tribe -- was described in the ad copy as "a faithful wool/nylon jacket modeled after a 1930s sporting coat.” It’s unclear if any Pawnee people had a role in designing the jacket. A search for "Pawnee" on the Ralph Lauren website now yields no results.

The famed designer behind his eponymous brand built his fashion empire on images of classic Americana, clothes that evoke the idyllic American dream. Many of his brand’s designs succeed in that -- from preppy polos to denim workwear -- and his Navajo prints of the 1980s popularized many indigenous patterns.

But where’s the line between celebration and appropriation? Last year, Ralph Lauren released another collection that raised some eyebrows. It had lots of Native American imagery, like headdresses and totem poles.

A representative for the Ralph Lauren company declined to comment for this article. Lauren himself, though, addressed his love for Native American aesthetics in an interview with the Associated Press last June. The designer reflected on his years growing up in the Bronx, New York.

“I grew up inspired by America, inspired by the West, inspired by the Adirondacks, inspired by African-Americans, soldiers -- life that I saw -- the Native Americans,” Lauren told the AP. “I saw a world that was different, and I was inspired.”

The Native American aesthetic is clearly a big part of Lauren's life. His Double RL Ranch in Colorado is chock-full of tents and artifacts, and there's even a decorative vintage photo of a nameless Native American child. After the ranch was featured on "The Oprah Winfrey Show" in 2011, Dr. Jessica Metcalfe, writing at the blog Beyond Buckskin, dubbed the photo the "ultimate form of appropriation."

"That little girl is someone," Metcalfe wrote at the time. "She's someone's daughter, sister, antie, niece, mother, cousin, granddaughter, grandmother."

There's a pervasive idea that Native Americans are a thing of the past, said Kim TallBear, a professor of anthropology and Native American and indigenous studies at the University of Texas at Austin. The idea that Native Americans no longer exist makes it easier for society to ignore their voices. Cultural representations of Native Americans are always focused on the past, she said, as seen in sports franchises like the Cleveland Indians and Washington's NFL team.

“There’s a national delusion that we’re all dead and vanished,” said TallBear, a member of the Sisseton Wahpeton Oyate in South Dakota. “We are contemporary, living people.”

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Joni Mitchell, Joan Didion, and Justin Bieber: Fashions New Superstars - Daily Beast

There were many plaudits when Joni Mitchell and Joan Didion were announced as the new faces of two major houses. It's welcome to feature older models, for sure, but are the campaigns really that radical?

Why do you buy clothes? Need? Panic? Pleasure? When do you buy them? A pinched, free hour on a Saturday, or a whole afternoon with cocktail breaks? Do the advertisements in glossy magazines, or fashion spreads featuring expensive threads and famous people, seduce you so totally that you will shell out hundreds, thousands of dollars to look as glamorous or hot as they do?

Fashion labels must have done this basic research and sunnily concluded, “You betcha,” because in just a week three celebrities have featured in three very different clothing company advertisements.

There were many cheers—silent, audible, and articulate cheers—when first the writer Joan Didion was announced the face of Céline, whose creative director is Phoebe Philo. Then the singer-songwriter Joni Mitchell was announced as the face of Saint Laurent.

There is a cuckoo in the nest: Around the same time, Justin Bieber appeared with his tight, taut body packed into a pair of Calvin Klein underpants. This advertisement definitely didn’t work for this reader: It immediately made me want to wear baggy, unattractive boxer shorts forever, because who would want to ape or emulate that spoiled, rude, entitled brat?

Of course, as everything surrounding Bieber tends to do, even this seemingly basic exhibition of his chiseled torso devolved into an unseemly spat and possible lawsuit around accusations that his abs were Photoshopped.

At the classier end of the spectrum, some have hailed Didion and Mitchell’s inclusion in the Céline and Saint Laurent campaigns as refreshing correctives to the norm of most fashion advertising that excludes older people. Praise also has been lavished on the labels for celebrating women known for their intelligent, profound words. These women’s minds and lyrical expressiveness are prized above their bodies.

In the Céline ad, Didion—photographed by Juergen Teller—is pictured in black, with a big pair of fuck-off sunglasses, looking like a cool Mafioso in the glare of her own greatness. She has a masterful look of disdain on her face, as if the photographer is interrupting her.

Alexandra Jacobs captured Didion’s tone perfectly in The New York Times after the news broke: “They got in touch with me,” Jacobs quoted Didion as saying in a tone “as crisp as one of Phoebe Philo’s cotton tunics.”

Mitchell, wearing a YSL fedora, an embroidered tunic made from Saint Laurent's Folk collection, and a barely visible cape that Saint Laurent’s creative director Hedi Slimane made for her, looks luminescent, softer than the hard-edged framing of Didion but just as commanding. Slimane himself shot Mitchell at her Bel Air home.

“It’s depressing to see your idols used to sell expensive clothes,” said Hadley Freeman in The Guardian .

She’s right: However cool the clothing labels deem both women, however brilliant their contributions to culture, however great that their age is celebrated in these photographs, they’re now also part of the fashion world—that gigantic consumerist maw that creates trends, crazes, and moments, just to make us spend stupid amounts of money to look like each other. Or to convince us to spend even larger amounts of money to look special.

The depressing thing about seeing the faces of Didion and Mitchell on these campaigns is that their artistry has hitherto transcended all the madness of trends and “fashion.”

“Céline and Saint Laurent hope to be enhanced in association with these two cultural powerhouses. This is fashion advertising, de-fashioned.”

These women did their own thing, whatever fashion trend happened to be passing outside.

Now they have been co-opted by the industry, and their images used on advertisements that propose we spend our money on overpriced clothes and perfumes and handbags.

The two women’s images—women whose professional worth and social standing floats above the perfect dress and right lipstick—are now part of the inflated consumerism that fashion embodies.

But of course, Didion has a publisher, and Mitchell a record company, both of which encourage us to buy their books and albums. They’re no strangers to the importance of marketing and selling themselves. But their art, the pleasure they give, is rooted in the reader and listener’s imagination, not on the sale rack.

This, of course, is what Céline and Saint Laurent are buying into and trading off: They are selling the cultural importance of the two women. Two companies that place looks above all else are using the perceived intellectual and artistic importance of their latest models above their looks to generate profit for their clothes.

Didion and Mitchell’s signings show Planet Fashion apparently uncomfortable with selling its wares nakedly, and commercially. Quite besides the women’s ages and the lack of lithe bodies on display, there isn’t even much overt clothes-selling going on in the images—Céline and Saint Laurent hope to be enhanced in association with these two cultural powerhouses.

This is fashion advertising, de-fashioned. Its cool is rooted in perception and association. It’s clever because it also targets older customers with money and younger customers who don’t want to be sold fashion blatantly, who’d rather say they listened to Joni Mitchell or read Joan Didion than cared about investing in a Céline blouse or Saint Laurent folk tunic.

All that makes the Bieber ad refreshingly direct and also brave on Calvin Klein’s part. Bieber’s star has been so tarnished in the public’s mind, you might wonder at the wisdom of anyone using his face and body to sell anything. But the Klein logic seems to be “better to be talked about than not.” It doesn’t matter what is being said about Bieber, just that so much is being said, so why not partake in the gyre?

A few months ago, I noted that the singer, buffeted by bad press, was using his smooth, hard boy-man body to sell himself, even while the audience booed him as he did so. But that behavior racked up Internet clicks (oh, quelle coincidence—Calvin Klein briefs!), as have these new, controversy-laced Klein advertisements.

What connects Bieber to Mitchell and Didion, however they are clad and whatever their age and pursuits, is the simple maxim “celebrity sells,” and to fine, ivory-towered or lefty-hippie minds as much as those marinated in pop culture. What would have been really radical would have been to have Didion and Mitchell shot swaggering in their underwear, and Bieber, fully clothed, reading The Brothers Karamazov.

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The 2015 Spring Fashion Trends We're Most Excited About - Huffington Post Canada

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Plus-Sized Fashion and the Sociologist's Gaze - Pacific Standard

“Women,” she argues—including plus-sized models—”experience their bodies as not solely for their pleasure and amusement but as under the constant gaze of others.”

“Despite all the problems in this industry, I’m rewarded for being myself. I’m grateful for there to be such an industry. I’m honored to take part in this field where I can potentially change minds about beauty.”

Ralph Lauren's Native American Ads Reveal Sad Truth About The Fashion World - Huffington Post

Joni Mitchell, Joan Didion, and Justin Bieber: Fashions New Superstars - Daily Beast

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CAD Blocks | CAD-ritning | Urban stadsdesign | arkitekturprojekt | Details

The 2015 Spring Fashion Trends We're Most Excited About - Huffington Post Canada

Recipes for job seekers, parents, and your health

Let's get a lot done this new year. :) —The IFTTT Team

Plus-Sized Fashion and the Sociologist's Gaze - Pacific Standard

“Women,” she argues—including plus-sized models—”experience their bodies as not solely for their pleasure and amusement but as under the constant gaze of others.”

“Despite all the problems in this industry, I’m rewarded for being myself. I’m grateful for there to be such an industry. I’m honored to take part in this field where I can potentially change minds about beauty.”

Ralph Lauren's Native American Ads Reveal Sad Truth About The Fashion World - Huffington Post

Joni Mitchell, Joan Didion, and Justin Bieber: Fashions New Superstars - Daily Beast

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