Clothes are never a frivolity: they always mean something, and that something is to a large extent outside the control of our conscious minds. — James Laver Copy Share Image
The erogenous zone is always shifting, and it is the business of fashion to pursue it, without ever catching it up. — James Laver Copy Share Image
If we could understand the full significance of a woman's hat we could prophesy her clothes for the next year, the interior decoration of… — James Laver Copy Share Image
Ten years before its time, a fashion is indecent; ten years after, it is hideous; but a century after, it is romantic. — James Laver Copy Share Image
Clothes are inevitable. They are nothing less than the furniture of the mind made visible. — James Laver Copy Share Image
When women take off their corsets and heighten their skirts it always means high inflation and low morals. — James Laver Copy Share Image
Poor Englishwomen! When it comes to their clothes- well, the French reaction is a shrug, the Italian reaction a spreading of the hands and… — James Laver Copy Share Image
The same costume will be Indecent ten years before its time, Shameless five years before its time, Outre (daring) one year before its time,… — James Laver Copy Share Image
When seen in retrospect, fashions seem to express their era. Although it is more difficult to draw conclusions from contemporary clothes, the same principles… — James Laver Copy Share Image
Every style seems completely appropriate to its epoch. We cannot imagine Madame de Pompadour, or the Empress Josephine, or the early Victorian lady in… — James Laver Copy Share Image
Avisitor from Mars contemplating a man in a frock coat and top hat and a woman in a crinoline might well have supposed that… — James Laver Copy Share Image
