Remember the social media storm about the color of the dress? Did you see blue and black or white and gold? It was some harmless fun that drew in millions of online punters.
But clothes are not frivolous, flippant, or foolish. In telling and talking about clothes, we reveal much about ourselves, our lives, and the experiences that we drape around our bodies. Whether bought or handmade, passed down or reconstructed, clothes help us to construct meaning as we remember those things in our lives that matter.
Apart from their aesthetic value, clothes have the ability to evoke issues of identity; of the relation of self to body and self to the world. We are able to find ourselves through the experience of delving into our wardrobes and remembering. Clothes are thus layered with meaning since they have the power to act as memory prompts.
