Fashion Vogue
Apparel Search fashion summary — a short guide to fashion vogue.
The word vogue means the prevailing fashion or style at a particular time. To be in vogue is to be popular and fashionable at once — the thing everyone who wants to be current is wearing, doing or talking about right now.
Fashion Vogue — Explore & Resources
A Word for What Is Prevailing
Vogue belongs to a family of near-synonyms that the fashion synonym summary linked from this page sets side by side. Fashion, style, vogue, fad, rage and craze all mean the usage accepted by those who want to be up-to-date or trendy in the clothing, footwear and accessories they wear — but they are not interchangeable.
Fashion is the most general term, applying to any way of dressing, behaving, writing or performing that is favoured at any one time or place. Vogue is narrower: it names the prevailing choice, the one currently winning. A fad or a craze is shorter and hotter still. Being vogue is therefore the fashion synonym of being trendy or stylish — with a shelf life built into the compliment, because what prevails this season is exactly what next season replaces.
Vogue the Magazine
The word also names the most famous fashion magazine in the world. Vogue is a fashion and lifestyle magazine covering fashion, beauty, culture, living and the runway. It began as a weekly newspaper in 1892 in the United States, before becoming a monthly publication years later.
The magazine and the word reinforce each other: a title that literally means the prevailing fashion has spent more than a century helping to decide what prevails. The Vogue Fashion coverage linked from this page is the magazine's own runway and style reporting, and the fashion magazine summary covers the wider shelf of fashion publications it sits at the head of.
Reading Vogue Critically
A word that contains its own expiry date teaches a useful reading habit. When a look is described as in vogue, the claim being made is about the present moment's agreement, not about the look's quality — plenty of excellent design never becomes vogue, and plenty of vogue design is forgotten by the following season. The magazine built on the word is read best with the same distinction in mind: its pages record what the industry has agreed to prevail, which is information, and information is not the same as instruction. A reader who separates the two can enjoy both the word and the magazine for exactly what they are — a report from the moving centre of fashion — while choosing clothes by fit, fabric and personal style, the three authorities that never go out of vogue because they were never in it. That independence, paradoxically, is what the best-dressed people in any era have always had in common.
Common Questions
What does vogue mean?
The prevailing fashion or style at a particular time. Something in vogue is popular, fashionable and current — the accepted choice of people who want to be up-to-date.
How does vogue differ from fashion?
Fashion is the general term for any favoured way of dressing at a time or place; vogue names the specific style that is prevailing right now, and a fad or craze is a shorter, sharper version of the same idea.
When did Vogue magazine begin?
In 1892, as a weekly newspaper in the United States. It later became a monthly fashion and lifestyle magazine covering fashion, beauty, culture, living and runway.