What if your favorite runway look isn’t your favorite runway look?
Imagine watching a model walk down a runway in a perfectly tailored black dress. The lighting is dramatic, her silhouette is sharp, and she looks practically perfect. You think: Oh, this is expensive.
Now change the song.
Suddenly, the same model looks less intimidating and more playful. The dress feels younger, maybe even a little casual. Change the song again and now she looks dangerous.
Same dress. Same model. Same runway. Completely different opinion.
And if that sounds dramatic, try it yourself. Watch a runway video with the sound off, decide how you feel about it, then play it again with a completely different soundtrack. There is a good chance your brain will start rewriting the story.
This raises an uncomfortable question: How much of our fashion taste actually belongs to us?
New York Fashion Week is here, and our feeds are filled with the usual parade of impossible outfits, tiny sunglasses, celebrity sightings and clothes that make us wonder whether we should completely reinvent our wardrobes by Monday.
But this Fashion Week, I need you to pay attention to something other than the clothes.
Listen.
Because the soundtrack might be doing more to convince you that a look is cool than the look itself.
Your brain hears the outfit before it understands it
We usually talk about fashion as if it is purely visual. We look at the dress, judge the silhouette, decide whether the shoes are cute and determine whether the whole thing is giving “kinda chic” or “absolutely not.”
But our brains do not experience a runway that way. We take in everything at once: the lighting, the models, the set, the pace of the walk, the audience and, perhaps most importantly, the music. Music is basically an emotional shortcut. You do not need to know why a song makes something feel luxurious. You just feel it.
A slow, cinematic track can make a simple black dress feel like old money. A pounding electronic beat can make it feel futuristic. Something dark and industrial can turn a model into the baddest villain you have ever seen. Put a ridiculous hyperpop song underneath the same outfit and suddenly you are thinking, Wait, would I actually wear that to a birthday party?
The clothes have not changed. Your brain has.
That is because we are constantly using context to figure out what we are looking at. Music is especially powerful because we react to it emotionally before we have time to intellectually analyze it. We do not sit there thinking, This song is making me associate the garment with rebellion.
We just think, Wait. That is kind of hot.
Fashion shows are selling you a lifestyle
This is what makes fashion shows so much more interesting than a really expensive version of walking into a store. A designer is not just presenting a skirt. They are creating a universe around it.
Think about the Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show. The lingerie is obviously important, but the clothes alone could never create the spectacle that makes the show such a cultural event. There are wings, performances, lighting, celebrity appearances, choreography, hair, makeup and music, all working together to create a story.
The woman you are watching is not simply wearing lingerie. She is confident, glamorous, desirable and completely in control of the room. The soundtrack helps sell that story.
Luxury fashion houses do the same thing, just with different aesthetics. A dramatic orchestra can make a collection feel historic. An experimental electronic score can make it feel futuristic. A nostalgic song can make something brand new feel strangely nostalgic. A recognizable pop song can make an exclusive runway feel in touch with the culture outside the fashion bubble.
And honestly, TikTok has been proving this for years
You already know this. You just probably have never thought about it as fashion psychology.
Think about your own outfit pictures. There is a reason you can take the same mirror selfie, add one song and think, Okay, wait, I look amazing. Then change it and suddenly hate the photo.
The outfit did not change. You changed.
That is why certain fashion aesthetics become inseparable from certain sounds online. Clean girl looks come with one emotional vocabulary. Indie sleaze has another. Coquette has another. Y2K has another.
Even when we cannot explain exactly what makes an aesthetic feel like itself, music helps establish the rules. A song can make an outfit feel romantic, ironic, sexy, nostalgic, intimidating or completely unserious. And when you are scrolling through TikTok at 1 a.m., your brain is not conducting a formal analysis of any of this. It is simply absorbing the association.
That song means this girl. That outfit means this lifestyle. That lifestyle means I want to be her. And suddenly you are looking at a pair of sunglasses you absolutely do not need.
are we being manipulated?
Kind of.
Not in the sinister, the fashion industry is controlling our minds way. Fashion is designed to make you want things. That is literally its job. The interesting part is how many different signals are working together to create that desire.
You think you are looking at a beautiful dress, but you are also hearing a soundtrack that tells you whether the dress is powerful or delicate. You are seeing lighting that tells you whether it belongs in a nightclub or a museum. You are watching a model whose body language tells you whether she is approachable or not.Â
By the time you think, I love this, your brain has already received a very detailed instruction manual for how you are supposed to feel about it. And that is not necessarily a bad thing. In fact, it is what makes fashion feel like culture instead of just clothing.
Fashion has always been about communication. We use clothes to say things about ourselves before we even speak. Music does the same thing. Put them together and they become almost impossible to separate.
You do not just see an outfit. You hear a lifestyle.
this makes Fashion Week way more interesting
We are not just buying clothes. We are buying the feeling attached to them. And the soundtrack helps create that feeling. So this Fashion Week, by all means, look at the clothes. Judge the shoes. Screenshot the bags. Text your friends about the one look that is either genius or deeply offensive.
But listen, too.
Because the next time you think a runway look is beautiful, ask yourself: Do I love the outfit, or do I love the world the music convinced me it belongs in?
Because sometimes, the song is part of the outfit.
And maybe your fashion taste is a little less objective than you thought ;)