60 Famous Quotes from Fashion Icons to Inspire Your Style

Fashion Quotes to Inspire Your Own Style

If you’re looking for style advice, critique, and general fashion inspiration all rolled into one, you can look to some of the most iconic designers and pop culture style icons for some quotable sayings. 

Here are just a few notable quotes from memorable figures in the fashion industry and beyond that could inspire your own style philosophy.

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“Playing dress-up begins at age five and never really ends.” — Kate Spade

“Fashion is the armor to survive the reality of everyday life.” — Bill Cunningham

“The fashionable woman wears clothes. The clothes don’t wear her.” — Mary Quant

“Never, ever confuse what happens on a runway with fashion. A runway is a spectacle. It’s only fashion when a woman puts it on. Being well dressed hasn’t much to do with having good clothes. It’s a question of good balance and good common sense.” — Oscar de la Renta

“Elegance is the only beauty that never fades.” — Audrey Hepburn

“Girls do not dress for boys. They dress for themselves and, of course, each other. If girls dressed for boys they’d just walk around naked at all times.” — Betsey Johnson

“Style is very personal. It has nothing to do with fashion. Fashion is over quickly. Style is forever.” — Ralph Lauren

“Give a girl the right shoes and she can conquer the world.”—Marilyn Monroe 

“Fashions fade, style is eternal.” — Yves Saint Laurent

“Dress shabbily and they remember the dress; dress impeccably and they remember the woman.” — Coco Chanel

“The customer is the final filter. What survives the whole process is what people wear. I’m not interested in making clothes that end up in some dusty museum.” – Marc Jacobs

“The most important thing to remember is that you can wear all the greatest clothes and all the greatest shoes, but you’ve got to have a good spirit on the inside. That’s what’s really going to make you look like you’re ready to rock the world.” — Alicia Keys

“Fashion is part of the daily air, and it changes all the time, with all the events. You can even see the approaching of a revolution in clothes. You can see and feel everything in clothes.” —  Diana Vreeland

“People like to say you’re either born with style or you’re not, and that’s complete hooey. You’ve gotta develop your own and find your own. We’re all completely different — different bones. Go for what suits you.” — Lauren Hutton

“I want people to see the dress, but focus on the woman.”—Vera Wang

 “In order to be irreplaceable one must always be different.” — Coco Chanel

“You can never take too much care over the choice of your shoes. Too many women think that they are unimportant, but the real proof of an elegant woman is what is on her feet.” —  Christian Dior

“One is never over-dressed or under-dressed with a Little Black Dress.” — Karl Lagerfeld 

“Fashion should be a form of escapism and not a form of imprisonment.” —  Alexander McQueen

“Fashion is not something that exists in dresses only. Fashion is in the sky, in the street; fashion has to do with ideas, the way we live, what is happening.” — Coco Chanel

“Fashion is only the attempt to realize art in living forms and social intercourse.” —  Sir Francis Bacon

“Fashion is a language. Some know it, some learn it, some never will – like an instinct.” — Edith Head

“What you wear is how you present yourself to the world, especially today when human contacts are so quick. Fashion is instant language.” — Miuccia Prada

“Fashion is like eating, you shouldn’t stick to the same menu.” — Kenzo Takada

“Shoes transform your body language and attitude. They lift you physically and emotionally.” — Christian Louboutin

“I don’t do fashion. I am fashion.”—Coco Chanel

“Florals? For spring? Groundbreaking.” — Miranda Priestly, The Devil Wears Prada

“Fashion you can buy, but style you possess. The key to style is learning who you are, which takes years. There’s no how-to road map to style. It’s about self-expression and, above all, attitude.” — Iris Apfel

“Over the years I have learned that what is important in a dress is the woman who is wearing it.” — Yves Saint Laurent

“We don’t need fashion to survive, we just desire it so much.” – Marc Jacobs

“When in doubt, wear red.” — Bill Blass

“Buy less. Choose well. Make it last. Quality, not quantity. Everybody’s buying far too many clothes.” — Vivienne Westwood

“Fashion is very important. It is life-enhancing, and, like everything that gives pleasure, it is worth doing well.” —  Vivienne Westwood

“In a machine age, dressmaking is one of the last refuges of the human, the personal, the inimitable.” — Christian Dior

“Being well dressed hasn’t much to do with having good clothes. It’s a question of good balance and good common sense.” — Oscar de la Renta

“On Wednesdays, we wear pink.”— Karen Smith, Mean Girls

“I love black because it affirms, designs, and styles. A woman in a black dress is a pencil stroke.” — Yves Saint Laurent

“A girl should be two things: classy and fabulous.”—Coco Chanel

“I don’t design clothes. I design dreams.”—Ralph Lauren

“A great dress can make you remember what is beautiful about life.” — Rachel Roy

“I firmly believe that with the right footwear, one can rule the world.” — Bette Midler

“Too much good taste can be very boring. Independent style, on the other hand, can be very inspiring.” — Diana Vreeland

“The best things in life are free. The second best are very expensive.” — Coco Chanel

“When you hear designers complaining about the challenge of their profession, you have to say: Don’t get carried away—it’s only dresses.” — Karl Lagerfeld

“We must never confuse elegance with snobbery.” — Yves Saint Laurent

“The joy of dressing is an art.” — John Galliano

“How can you live the high life if you do not wear high heels?” — Sonia Rykiel

“My fashion is about the urban woman in the year 3000. I think about obscure, weird things and try to create a world around them.” — Lady Gaga

“You can have anything you want in life if you dress for it.” – Edith Head

“Style is a simple way of saying complicated things.” — Jean Cocteau

“Clothes mean nothing until someone lives in them.” — Marc Jacobs

“A woman can carry a bag. But it’s the shoe that carries the woman.” — Christian Louboutin

“Fashion is not something that exists in dresses only. Fashion is in the sky, in the street; fashion has to do with ideas, the way we live, what is happening.” — Coco Chanel

“Style is a way to say who you are without having to speak.”—Rachel Zoe

“A woman is never sexier than when she is comfortable in her clothes.” — Vera Wang

“It’s better to have fewer things of quality than too much expendable junk.” — Rachel Zoe

 “I’ve always thought of accessories as the exclamation point of a woman’s outfit.” — Michael Kors

“Whoever said that money can’t buy happiness, simply didn’t know where to go shopping.” — Bo Derek

“You can wear black at any time. You can wear it at any age. You may wear it for almost any occasion.” — Christian Dior

“Fashion is not necessarily about labels. It’s not about brands. It’s about something else that comes from within you.” — Ralph Lauren

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Final Note

By encouraging us to consider how we want to express ourselves through our clothing choices, fashion quotes can help define and shape our personal style. By just reading even one style quote that inspires us, we are reminded to be true to ourselves and to wear clothing that makes us feel good about ourselves.