In yesterday's post we looked at a biological inspiration that could serve as the starting point for innovative designs. But maybe the principles of biology may not just inspire, but may be used to explain the laws governing fashion.
Let's think for example about Batesian and Müllerian Mimicry: explained by English explorer-naturalist Henry Walter Bates the former refers to a mimicry process adopted by harmless species that, palatable to a predator, mimic the appearance of a harmful or noxious species to protect themselves even though they wouldn't have the actual defenses to do so when attacked.
It was German naturalist Fritz Müller who in 1878 provided instead an evolutionary explanation for the close similarity of co-existing unpalatable prey species: according to him, two or more unprofitable (often, distasteful) species evolve to look similar to each other to their mutual benefit, since predators are repelled as they learn to avoid all of them and this causes lesser fatalities.
In both forms of mimicry there is a pattern of emergence and assimilation linking the original and the copy, the model and the repetition, both these forms are also directly linked to the need to survive (the species copy each others to avoid and "educate" predators).
In Müllerian Mimicry you also get an infinite multiplicity and a continuous series of variations; this form of mimicry also implies the loss of singularities in favour of multitude and repetition. Several labels, brands and houses coexist in the realm of the fashion industry, but in the last few years we have seen a loss of distinctions and uniqueness in favour of a sort of principle of assimilation and adaptation: one label may copy another endlessly not to repel but to attract the consumer, using a form of visual mimicry (rather than originality) to make sure the consumer gets specific messages ("I'm as trendy/fashionable/cool as that other label/I can give you status as that other label/etc").
In Müllerian Mimicry species reduce the mortality involved in training predators to avoid them; in fashion labels and brands train and lure consumers, so this is mimicry based on the laws of attraction rather than repulsion; species do it to survive and labels act along the same line, to sell and therefore survive in the wide and dangerous fashion juingle.
Somehow it would be more fascinating if the endless copying cycles - pardon fashion cycles - were to be linked with biology and mimicry, but maybe looking for a biological explanation is simply useless and all these copying exercises should be attributed to a lack of design talent and a proliferation of laziness in most fashion-related fields, from the production of garments and accessories to the beauty and fragrance industry (as proved also by the recent and rather useless debate about KKW Body by Kim Kardashian, a fragrance packaged in a body-shaped bottle reminiscent of Jean-Paul Gaultier's Classique packaging that in turn was a modern copy of Elsa Schiaparelli's Shocking inspired by Mae West's torso...).
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