Scientists Finally Figured Out What This 8,000 Year Old Piece of Clothing Was Made From
Your mid-week fashion news digest is here.
This is the Wednesday NEWSletter where I break down a few fashion news stories you should know about this week and why. The fashion industry has a lot of news and not all of it makes it to the masses with the assumption that it’s too “insidery,” which is bullshit. Fashion often tells one side of a larger story, and usually, it impacts us all.
Scientists conclude a 60 year investigation on one of the oldest pieces of clothing.
For 60 years, scientists have been investigating the material of a piece of clothing created and worn in the Stone Ages in Turkey, around 8,000 years ago. According to Sci Tech Daily, the piece was found in Çatalhöyük, the world’s largest known Stone Age settlement. For decades, scientists believed the bast fiber was made out of flax and therefore must have been linen, but it turns out it was something completely different. This new analysis by Sabine Karg and Lise Bender Jørgensen published in Antiquity found that no flax had ever been imported to the region and it’s likely that the material was made from oak.
What makes this interesting to me is that it once again shows how clothing can tell a story that is so much bigger than the actual final product that’s worn. Now scientists understand that tree bast may have had a significant role in the day to day life of neolithic people, something that without that piece of clothing they may have not understood.
The Creative Director switch up at Bottega speaks to an interesting trend in luxury.
After 3 years, creative director Daniel Lee has amicably left his post at Bottega Veneta. A day later the brand announced that Matthieu Blazy, formerly a designer at Celine and Calvin Klein before coming to Bottega in 2020, would take his place.
With creative directors coming and going from luxury brands seemingly once a month, I can understand the urge to not really care about this. However, something that strikes me is how product sells when these designers leave their posts. When Lee announced his departure, for example, within minutes there was social media dedicated to “old Bottega,” meaning people want to buy up as much product designed by him as possible before the value increases. While the brands might not see much profit in the resale market from this practice, it’s certainly good for them from a marketing perspective.
To be clear, the three year switch up has a lot to do with contracts, and I’m not suggesting the brand does this to create demand. It’s just an interesting result that speaks to consumerism around luxury products – we want what no one else can have.
Everyone is suddenly into Red.
If you are alive, you’re probably aware that Taylor Swift rereleased her album Red (Taylor’s Version), late last week. One of the biggest songs was a new version of “All Too Well,” a ballad speculated to be about her brief relationship with Jake Gyllenhaal. In the song and accompanying short film, she sings about leaving behind a red scarf … get it? Anyway, following the release of the album, searches for “red scarf” increased drastically. This says to me that one. we will be seeing a lot of red lip, red scarf combos this winter. And two, everyone is searching whether or not Gylenhaal has revealed if he still has the scarf.