Fashion means much more than dress. There are fashions in all aspects of life, from the time and manner of taking meals to the ways in which people sit. Clothes are animated by bodies moving in space, through gesture and deportment, and attitudes towards work and leisure that have changed dramatically across culture and time. The dressed body occupies space in coded ways that are learned through socialisation and that are also subject to fashion.

This anthology explores the multi-dimensions of fashion, from the market to the imagination. Fashion, a series of experts argue, is relational and weighty, yet still figures in the media and popular imagination as nebulous and opaque. This anthology seeks to overturn that popular view, introducing readers to new ways of conceptualising their interest and participation in fashion past and present.