“Every time a woman leaves off something she looks better, but every time a man leaves off something he looks worse.”
“Those who make their dress a principal part of themselves will, in general, become of no more value than their dress.”
“Costly thy habit as thy purse can buy, but not expressed in fancy; rich not gaudy; for the apparel oft proclaims the man.”
“Women's sexy underwear is a minor but significant growth industry of late-twentieth-century Britain in the twilight of capitalism.”
“All women's dresses are merely variations on the eternal struggle between the admitted desire to dress and the unadmitted desire to undress.”
“If men can run the world, why can't they stop wearing neckties? How intelligent is it to start the day by tying a little noose around your neck?”
“A fine woman shows her charms to most advantage when she seems most to conceal them. The finest bosom in nature is not so fine as what imagination forms.”
“The difference between a man of sense and a fop is that the fop values himself upon his dress; and the man of sense laughs at it, at the same time he knows he must not neglect it.”
“The origins of clothing are not practical. They are mystical and erotic. The primitive man in the wolf-pelt was not keeping dry; he was saying: ''Look what I killed. Aren't I the best?''”
“I have heard with admiring submission the experience of the lady who declared that the sense of being perfectly well dressed gives a feeling of inward tranquility which religion is powerless to bestow.”
“There is much to support the view that it is clothes that wear us, and not we, them; we may make them take the mould of arm or breast, but they mould our hearts, our brains, our tongues to their liking.”
“I have often said that I wish I had invented blue jeans: the most spectacular, the most practical, the most relaxed and nonchalant. They have expression, modesty, sex appeal, simplicity -- all I hope for in my clothes.”
“They look quite promising in the shop; and not entirely without hope when I get them back into my wardrobe. But then, when I put them on they tend to deteriorate with a very strange rapidity and one feels so sorry for them.”
“An accent mark, perhaps, instead of a whole western accent -- a point of punctuation rather than a uniform twang. That is how it should be worn: as a quiet point of character reference, an apt phrase of sartorial allusion -- macho, sotto voce.”
“It is principally for the sake of the leg that a change in the dress of man is so much to be desired. The leg is the best part of the figure and the best leg is the man s. Man should no longer disguise the long lines, the strong forms, in those lengths of piping or tubing that are of all garments the most stupid.”
“The beauty of the internal nature cannot be so far concealed by its accidental vesture, but that the spirit of its form shall communicate itself to the very disguise and indicate the shape it hides from the manner in which it is worn. A majestic form and graceful motions will express themselves through the most barbarous and tasteless costume.”
“For women... bras, panties, bathing suits, and other stereotypical gear are visual reminders of a commercial, idealized feminine image that our real and diverse female bodies can't possibly fit. Without these visual references, each individual woman's body demands to be accepted on its own terms. We stop being comparatives. We begin to be unique.”