Codes for clothing exists in various niches of society, of varying rigidity. They are identifiable in neutral spaces that then govern the impression that defines the person. Neutral spaces, in the case, exist as zones void of fashion conduct. On a street, one such example of a neutral space, a suit would signal a businessman, scrubs a nurse, plaid skirt and blazer, a school girl. For all these occupations, this code carries two layers: The obligatory donning of the garb and the voluntary representation of self. The former relies a necessary level of conformity to the environment to produce the least resistance (e.g. not losing one’s job). The latter then influences how much that environment impacts adherence to codes in other environments and daily style (e.g. gauges in the workplace).
For my interviews, I looked to two athletes to help mark this distinction and how well preserved or blurred the lines may be.
DARYA “DASHA” KOSTIKINA
Dasha is a a close personal friend of mine whose style I see on a daily basis. She is 18, Russian American, and plays tennis. When I asked her to explain her style, she replied “I wear comfortable clothing”. For practice she often wears a combination of t-shirts, sweatshirts, shorts, and tennis skirts. The dress code requires them to wear something that is either dry-fit or labeled with the Wellesley logo. When she is free, however, from the threat of running laps, her style changes minimally. Her main edict for dressing is that she, “doesn’t like pants”. She will instead dress in leggings, loose fitting dresses, shorts, skirts, giraffe suits, and spandex. She will often choose sport bras over their regular counterpart, and will rarely fashion her hair into a style more complex than a pony tail. Even without the confines of tennis dress code, her style reflects her sympathizing and identifying with the athlete code of dress. Here, there is little distinction between her obligatory dress code and the voluntary representation of herself.
As we explored her closet and she explained the background behind each piece of clothing, this lack of separation became increasingly clear. Inside, her clothes were divided in origin. Those that she bought with her own money, and those her mother found and bought for her. For the clothes she acquired herself, we found a mix of free, sports themed activewear she earned from tournaments, and Wellesley merchandise and concert t-shirts. For outings that dictated a more formal style of dress, like dinners, she relied on her mother’s choices that she approved. Often these choices accentuated her legs, a feature she found very pleasantly shaped by her daily tennis conditioning. The outfit she felt most comfortable in, though only in the privacy of her home, was a giraffe onesie, the first clothing item she ever purchased herself.
Though the onesie and some of her clothes wouldn’t be considered ‘sportswear’ there is so great a similarity shared amongst the entire wardrobe, that the difference between practice and casual became obscured. In the public, private, casual, and formal sphere she relies on loose, outfits that promotes the greatest amount of movement and comfort. In the neutral space, she both wears the sweatshirt and tennis skirt because her role as athlete demands it, and because she willingly appreciates the code of dress. This does not mean she identifies specifically as an athlete in other environments that do not require it, so much as she adopted and identifies with the style of dress.
https://drive.google.com/a/wellesley.edu/?usp=gmail#folders/0B9CPtM8nbGH8TURKWXNlYmtTcmM
JESSICA “JESSIE” WONG
Jessie is another athlete, her sport of choice being Ultimate Frisbee. She is Chinese America, lived in Massachusetts her entire life, is 18 years of age, and unlike Dasha marks a clear line between her style for training, and her style for day to day life. Only on days with little time allotted to change will she, “just straight up dress for practice.” This, however, did not define her appearance, which she succinctly labeled, “half hipster, half preppy”. Like Dasha, she described a lot of what she wore as comfortable, though by contrast many of the pieces were fitting for more social, and less active settings. Notably her team’s dress code was comparatively less restrictive, with the only guideline being an awareness of future sweat, dirt, and grass stains along with wear and tear. When describing her frisbee getup she listed a combination of shorts, leggings, and penny shirts; clothes of either heightened durability, launderability, or disposability.
https://drive.google.com/a/wellesley.edu/?usp=gmail#folders/0B9CPtM8nbGH8WlNCRDBORXhIQkk
This did not carry through to her daily look which currently was comprised of sweaters and jeans. In warmer weathers the discrepancy remained. She showed similarly shaped dresses with form fitting tops and flowing bottoms, a leather jacket from Italy she was eager to break in, and long shirts belonging to her dad that she paired together with leggings. Jessie also showed a great interest in texture and color. Many of her sweaters, jackets, and dresses felt soft, smooth, or fuzzy to the touch, and held bright, distinct color patterns.
What textures do you like? “The fuzzy ones”.
https://docs.google.com/a/wellesley.edu/file/d/0B9CPtM8nbGH8LTJxdHZDcE90aldEZGs3T2V1MjU2SlE5ZE9J/edit
“Since its sweater weather, basically just a sweater. If I’m being real, I also just bought a bunch of sweaters.”
“Um so i got this jacket in Italy over the summer. It’s the most expensive thing I own. I also really really like it.”
This segregation amongst her closet, likely related back to the very real hazard provided by her sport, however, does not explain it’s cause. Her style did not come forth from her need to keep her casual clothes separate from her frisbee practice wear. When asked the source of her look she referred to Seventeen Magazine, as a source of initial inspiration in her seventh grade, and her, and her mother’s, own preferences in the following years. Though she did not conform to the athletic mode of dress, there was still a set code she attuned herself to. Though she followed through with the obligatory style of dress for practice, she willfully ascribed to another at all other times, in all other environments.
CONCLUSION
Conformity in the sense of dress, has no set universal standard, but is rather a facet of various cultures and environments. What would be considered appropriate in one space could very well incite penalty in another. A bathing suit on the beach would be as scandalous on a cold mountain as a renaissance gown in a hospital. Only in neutral spaces, sections caught between distinct areas of dress, would this eclecticism become apparent and within those spaces exist the possibility of both the obligation of dress (conformity) and voluntarism of style (self expression), and the various combinations in between. In parks, sidewalks, parades, vegas hotels, and such areas there would exist the spectrum between how people should appear and how they choose to present themselves.
In the case of my interviews, it showed the lines are unclear, governed solely have individual discrepancies. For one interviewee her conformity to her sport’s dress code blurred with her own willingness to appropriate its apparel. For the other, the separation between her athletics and casual life was kept clear and definite. She, however, did conform to a certain aesthetic that governed her looks the neutral spaces, and many other environments. Both, nonetheless, and most others are navigating the immeasurable space that lies between self expression and conformity, and lies beyond any set dress code. My post is a mere snapshot of the wide range of possibility that lies in its folds.
Wow, love the sweater weather comment. Totally me. I think it’s really great to see the way people maintain a personal style in cold weather when the clothes start to be about utility rather than fashion.
It’s amazing how our hobbies become a part of our identities, or at least how we present ourselves to the world. My interviewee had similar things to say about how being a golfer affects the way she dresses, and how she likes to look preppy. I’m wondering how the amount of time one has been playing a sport affects the degree to which it influences your style? For instance, has Dasha been playing tennis since she was very young? Has Jessie just begun playing frisbee since she came to Wellesley and therefore it has affected her fashion less? Interesting to think about.