Watching the English

THE ECCENTRIC-SHEEP RULE

Sharp-eyed readers will have noticed that I seem to be including 'innovative street-fashion' in the category of 'uniform' - and you might perhaps be questioning my judgement. Surely this is a contradiction? Surely the quirky, outlandish, sub-culture street-fashions - cockatoo-haired punks, Victorian-vampire Goths, scary-booted skinheads - for which the English are renowned are evidence of our eccentricity and originality, not conformist, conservative rule-following? The idea that English street-fashion is characterized by eccentricity and imaginative creativity has become a universally accepted 'fact' among fashion writers - not only in popular magazines but also in academic, scholarly works on English dress. Even the normally cynical Jeremy Paxman fails to question this stereotype, reiterating the widely accepted view that English street-fashions 'all express a basic belief in the liberty of the individual'. But what most people think of as English eccentricity in dress is really the opposite: it is tribalism, a form of conformity, a uniform. Punks, Goths and so on may look outlandish, but this is everyone - or rather a well-defined group - all being outlandish in exactly the same way. There is nothing idiosyncratic or eccentric about English street-fashions: they are just subcultural affiliation signals.

Designers such as Vivienne Westwood and Alexander McQueen pick up on these street-fashion trends and interpret and glamorise them on the international catwalks, and everyone says, 'Oooh how eccentric, how English,' but really there is nothing terribly eccentric about a diluted copy of a uniform. Street-fashions do not even function for very long as effective sub-cultural affiliation signals, as these styles invariably and rapidly become 'mainstream': no sooner do youth sub-cultures invent some daft new tribal costume than the avant-garde designers pick it up, then a somewhat more muted interpretation appears in the high-street shops and everyone is wearing a version of it, including one's mother. This is infuriating for the young originators of these street-styles. English youth tribes spend a lot of time and energy trying to avoid being 'mainstream' - a dirty word, used as an insult - but this does not make them eccentric, anarchic individualists: they are still conformist sheep, all disguised in the same wolf's clothing.

The most truly eccentric dresser in this country is the Queen, who pays no attention whatsoever to fashion, mainstream or otherwise, continuing to wear the same highly idiosyncratic style of clothing (a kind of modified 1950s-retro look, if you had to define it in fashion-speak, but very much her own personal taste) with no regard for anyone else's opinion. Because she is the Queen, people call her style 'classic' and 'timeless' rather than eccentric or weird, politely overlooking the fact that absolutely no-one else dresses in this peculiar way. Never mind the herds of street-sheep and their haute-couture imitators: the Queen is the best example of English sartorial eccentricity.

Having said that, young English sub-cultural sheep do invent clothing styles that are significantly more wacky and outrageous than any other nations' street-fashions - indeed, the rebellious youth of many other nations tend to imitate English street-fashions rather than going to the trouble of inventing their own. We may not be individually eccentric, apart from the Queen, but our youth sub-culture groups do have a sort of collective eccentricity, if that is not a contradiction in terms. At any rate, we appreciate originality, and we take pride in our reputation for sartorial eccentricity, however undeserved it may be.