Happy third day of school! I can’t believe this column is four years old now, and I can’t wait to kick off my final year with you all. 

This summer, I’ve been experiencing all the glorious humidity New York offers. While I thought I would talk about what I noticed about the differences of East Coast versus West Coast fashion, something else piqued my interest even more. 

I’ve been fascinated by how some New Yorkers dress to accommodate — or attempt to ignore — the sweltering and suffocating beads of sweat on the tourist-packed streets and stuffy subway lines. It made me think about Guerlain’s “Rouge G” lipstick cases, customizable by material or engraving and equipped with a mirror inside. 

When Lorenz Bäumer, a legendary jeweler, was tasked to design a lipstick case for Guerlain’s makeup line, he looked beyond utility and external beauty. Seeing it as a way to enhance the feminine experience (based on his observations of women with lipsticks), he came to understand that one could “embellish women even with something as simple as a lipstick.” So, the flip-up case was created to reveal the mirror for lipstick application assistance and to spy on and observe the world around them inconspicuously. 

It seemed that the habits of Bäumer’s surroundings informed the design of the lipstick, just as New Yorkers’ daily style and dressing habits informed the way they chose to approach the thick air — from experience or from defeat, ultimately either trying to avoid certain materials, colors and layers or giving up and wearing whatever they wanted. 

But this seems almost the opposite of Donatella Versace’s approach to dresses and her viewpoint of them as a weapon for women. As “something that will help you to get something you want in life,” she sees clothes as a sense of empowerment and otherness — the same sort of “embellishment” Bäumer was referring to — that comes from the clothes themselves rather than the wearer. 

Of course, women are particularly educated early on about clothing choices and what they may subconsciously communicate, despite any lack of intentionality behind them. However, when dressing in certain ways to draw or avoid attention, achieve goals or sway decisions, clothing becomes a catalyst or enabler of certain habits, actions and results. 

Is this, then, manipulating the clothing item unfairly and advantageously? Is it exploitative of fashion and the purpose behind the creation of the clothes? And who or where does the blame fall when clothes become purely transactional? Is it even a bad thing if the purpose extends beyond the original intent of the wearer, designer, manufacturer, stylist or muse?  

It is an odd concept to think about — placing blame or accountability on static objects that we assign meaning to with varying degrees based on personal biases and experiences in life. 

And yet, it consumes us — or at least me — in every way. When piecing outfits together, I consistently consider how it may come off to varying audiences, how comfortable I feel, if it is congenial with the vibe at hand. I think about how it moves, falls, fits, smells and every other detail under the sun. It’s odd to think about the opposite end of the spectrum, where clothes are clothes and nothing else beyond that. 

Of course, I could easily cross over if I wasn’t so hyper-aware of being perceived, just as I, a previous fashion hater (it was my fifth grade, “rebellious,” not girly phase, okay?), have grown to love clothes beyond verbal comprehension. 

I’ve come to realize, though, that the shift in clothing choices stemming from habits or informed by habits comes from the different roles it plays in my life. Ironically, for someone who tends to get confused with floating numbers, it only makes sense when I lay out particular choices on a literal scale from one to 10: 10 being chosen for a habit and one being chosen because of a habit.

I have begun wearing silk sleep sets at night because it is cooler in the heat and makes me feel feminine and beautiful when I wake up (a six on a scale of one through 10); I bought myself my first designer bag as a means to congratulate myself on my 68-hour workweeks in tech consulting this summer (a four, as it serves function, but is mainly a reward); and I see buying dresses, vintage bags and antique jewelry as some of my favorite gifts because (and call me shallow, I don’t care), with my love language being gift giving, I love to receive gifts and feel thought about (an eight for the gift-giving habit and a one because of the latter explanation). 

While I don’t want to continue to go through my life and my analysis of people’s clothes in such a mathematical, rigid way, for me, it helps make sense of the “why” behind design, clothing and industry. Serving as a sense of stability, it helps me feel rooted in my fashion spirituality as my style matures. I make space in my closet for the next season and in my head for my next bouts of inspiration.

In a period of wonder, nostalgia, excitement and not knowing, anything that makes a little more sense is something I’ll grasp onto. 

Hadyn Phillips is a senior writing about fashion in the 21st century, spotlighting new trends and popular controversy in her column, “That’s Fashion, Sweetie.” Her column runs every Wednesday.