Intellectual Fashion/Fashion Intellectual: Luxury, Branding, and the Glamorization of Theory

InNo Logo, Naomi Klein states: “It is not to sponsor culture but to be the culture”, referring toworld-famous brands that started approaching new and experimental marketing techniques. Yet, asearly as 1974, Pierre Bourdieu argued that the discourse onhaute couturewas already a discourse onhaute culture, undoing the exquisitely philosophical prejudice that collocated fashion among smalland frivolous things, unworthy of observation. This paper returns to this question through investi-gating the case ofGucci Aria, which used famous books of philosophy and critical theory as props.Even if this is not a novelty in the fashion world — from Miuccia Prada’s “radical chic-ism” to MartinMargiela’s deconstruction — what is new is that fashion has found itself having to study and incor-porate knowledge that comes from the so-called high culture usually aimed at a niche audience ofintellectuals. This is more than the attempt of lifestyle branding to address social and political move-ments’ vindications as part of the social corporate responsibility strategy. What is the purpose behindselling theory itself? How can this exploitation carried out by fashion brands be read as a way of popu-larizing high culture? Are fashion designers playing at being organic intellectuals and is conspicuousconsumption finding its new goal?