Recently, I watched The Devil Wears Prada 2. People in the apparel industry had been talking about it, which made me curious. Since I had never seen the first film, I watched it first, then went to the theater the following day.
The first film seemed to carry the message that work is not everything in life. The sequel, by contrast, portrays people trying to protect things that cannot be measured only by profit or efficiency. It felt like a film that reflected the changes that have taken place between 2006, when the first film was released, and the present day in 2026.
As a man, I think I have spent more money on clothing than most. That is probably why I find myself questioning the current tendency to prioritize efficiency, the increasingly rapid product cycle, and the way social media buzz has become a direct path to purchase, shortening the lifespan of trends.
In the film, tech billionaires are shown as people who have come to wield great influence in the economy. They appear at work in casual clothes and are portrayed as seeing the apparel business only as an investment target.
This may be a somewhat stereotypical depiction, but in reality, many tech billionaires do seem to value efficiency and transformation more than spending time on their appearance. The countercultural idea that “ability matters more than looks” has, at some point, become a new kind of authority and charisma.
At the same time, the product cycle in fashion has also accelerated. People who enjoy dressing up can enjoy constantly changing their appearance within that cycle. Those with little interest in clothing can simply decide that inexpensive fast fashion is enough.
There is a scene in the film where a tech billionaire says, “Tradition, huh? Soon, we won’t need models, locations, or even designers. It’ll all be AI.” Yet the more a job is driven by efficiency, the more it seems suited to AI. If that is the case, investors themselves may also fall within the scope of what can be “replaced.”
If AI comes to take over the realm of efficiency, perhaps humans will begin to seek values other than efficiency more strongly. If so, the current situation, in which value is measured primarily by efficiency, may gradually begin to change.
In the film, people in apparel and luxury fashion are portrayed as those trying to protect culture. Yet I have some doubts about that as well. They, too, have been on the side of creating cycles of trend and consumption. After all, it is more profitable when people keep wanting new things than when they continue wearing the same things for a long time.
Of course, some things born from those cycles have taken root. In fact, I suspect there may once have been more room for such things to emerge than there is today. Perhaps there was still enough time for people to recognize universal value, and for makers to ensure a level of quality worthy of that value.
What we now call classic menswear also has its origins in the fashions of different eras. Among the countless styles that appeared and disappeared, some passed through the filter of time and continued to evoke a sense of universal beauty. That, I think, is why they were able to become classics.
Still, even if time can sort value from mere novelty, that alone is not enough for culture to survive. There must be people who make things, people who buy them, and people who continue to use them. Only then can they be passed on to the next era.
In Japan, the environment for producing clothing domestically continues to shrink, while many skilled artisans are growing older or retiring. Perhaps the situation is similar in your country as well. In such a time, I was reminded once again of the importance of spending money on the things I want to see preserved.
