Ordinary Unhappiness 114: Fashion and Psychoanalysis feat. Valerie Steele
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Sep 13, 2025 Valerie Steele, a leading fashion scholar and curator, dives into the intricate relationship between fashion and psychoanalysis. She discusses why fashion remains dismissed in academia and examines its implications on identity and gender. Steele explores how clothing serves as a form of psychic armor and highlights the concept of the 'skin ego.' From Freud to modern fashion, she links garments to emotional experiences, revealing fashion's dual role as both a source of pleasure and a protective barrier. Their discussion also uncovers how clothing can embody personal and cultural narratives.
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Freud's Fastidious Dressing Habits
- Sigmund Freud obsessed over appearances and even missed his father’s funeral because of his barber's line.
- Anna Freud knitted during sessions and made her own clothes but avoided sewing machines while listening to patients.
Why Fashion Is Academically Dismissed
- Fashion is dismissed because it's tied to bodies, commercialism, and femininity, which many academics and analysts devalue.
- Both scholars and fashion insiders resist analysis: scholars see it as frivolous, designers fear killing its magic.
Exhibition Objects Made Theory Tangible
- Valerie Steele curated garments to illustrate psychoanalytic concepts, like a chocolate-bar dress for oral pleasure and Schiaparelli's mirror jacket for Lacan's mirror stage.
- She secured loans including Schiaparelli's mirror jacket and Versace's safety-pin dress to make theory tangible.
