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What is Glamour?

In defining Glamour you must know its origins and the history behind how the word is used today. Originally Glamour was termed in the 1700’s in reference to a spell cast upon someone to see things differently and more alluring than they really are.

We have witchcraft to thank for the development for the modern day usage of Glamour to describe the airbrushed beauties on the front of all your magazines. Its current definition as described by Websters Dictionary is “A charm affecting the eye, making objects appear different from what they really are”. Included in the list of definitions still resides the archaic definitions from its association with witchcraft, but what does it really mean to us today?

Glamour in your world

Glamour is mostly associated with pictures of beautiful people on the covers of magazines, but it is really nothing more than something the evokes feelings of elegance and a lifestyle above your own. It has way of making you feel like you want or need it.

The marketing and advertising world knows how to make things glamorous, because they know it sells products. It makes that woman on the front of that magazine seem sexier, and if you buy this glamorous lipstick it will make you glamorous too.

Pretty doesn’t equate to Glamour

Just because you see something as beautiful or glittery, does not make it beautiful. I was reading an article a while back about the the watch industry, and while Rolex may be a glamorous brand, simply adding some diamonds to the watch face does not inherently make the watch glamorous. The lifestyle the brand Rolex promotes makes all of its watches glamorous. Would you put that watch on your wrist and immediatley feel that it itself is glamorous? Probably not. You would find it to be a fine watch, and it would look very good, but hardly glamorous. Just think about the things you’ve bought because they were considered glamorous, and then ask yourself if buying that made you glamorous.

Its a game, and allusion, and honestly its a hell of a lot of hard work to create something glamorous. Movie actors are considered glamorous, but if you ask any of them if their job is glamorous, you will probably find that they don’t consider the work glamorous, and will explain all the amount of work that goes into making the end results glamorous.

I love working with images and making them have a certain appeal that probably wasnt there from the start. I love bringing out qualities of a person that might be hidden and otherwise lost. Its just so much fun….

Virginia Postrel on Glamour

If you have some spare time, and I haven’t bored you to death yet, make sure to check out this TED talk by Virginia Postrel. She makes some excellent points about glamour and covers some of what I’ve already mentioned, but albeit in a lot more detail.