Every style seems completely appropriate to its epoch. We cannot imagine Madame de Pompadour, or the Empress Josephine, or the early Victorian lady in anything but the clothes she actually wore. Each represents completely the ideals of her time: elegant… — 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
