By Jussara Da Silva
There are few words in fashion that are used more confidently and understood less carefully than taste. We speak of it as though it were a personal possession, something that certain people naturally have and others simply do not. “She has good taste.” “He has no taste.” The judgments arrive quickly, almost instinctively, as though taste were an inborn quality rather than something developed over years of observation, curiosity and education.
Perhaps this is why conversations about fashion so often become conversations about preference. Someone wears an outfit and we immediately respond, I like it or I don’t. A collection appears on the runway and within minutes it is declared beautiful, ugly, boring or extraordinary. Our first emotional reaction has become the measure through which we evaluate almost everything. We have quietly assumed that liking something and recognising its quality are one and the same.
They are not.
The first step towards understanding taste is recognising that taste and preference describe two entirely different experiences. Preference begins and ends with ourselves. It asks a simple question: Do I like this? Taste asks something much more difficult: Can I understand why this is good, even if it is not for me?
The distinction may seem insignificant, but it changes the entire conversation.
I have always been drawn to simplicity. My wardrobe consists almost entirely of neutral colours, clean tailoring and uncomplicated silhouettes. I rarely feel the desire to wear bold prints, dramatic jewellery or expressive layering. That is not because those things lack beauty. It is because they do not reflect the way I choose to express myself.
Yet I regularly encounter people whose style could not be further from my own. They build outfits through colour, vintage references, layered accessories and unexpected combinations that I would never personally wear. And still, I can recognise when those choices have been made with intelligence, balance and intention. I can admire the relationship between colour, proportion, texture and silhouette without feeling any desire to recreate it myself.
That is taste.
Not agreement.
Understanding.
This is perhaps where contemporary conversations about fashion have become most confused. We increasingly believe that if something does not appeal to us personally, it cannot possibly possess value. We have become so accustomed to filtering the world through our own preferences that we forget another possibility exists: appreciating something without needing to possess it.
Fashion has always asked us to cultivate that ability.
Few people would wear every collection Rei Kawakubo has designed, yet her influence upon contemporary fashion is undeniable. Martin Margiela challenged ideas of construction, authorship and branding in ways that permanently altered the industry, even for those who would never wear his clothes. Alexander McQueen’s theatrical imagination continues to inspire generations of designers despite the fact that many of his garments were never intended for everyday life.
To recognise their significance does not require imitation.
It requires understanding.
Taste allows us to admire excellence without demanding similarity.
History reinforces this lesson again and again. Every generation has believed its own taste to be self-evident. Styles once dismissed as vulgar later became symbols of refinement. Designers criticised for being incomprehensible are now studied in museums. What one era rejected as strange, another eventually recognised as visionary.
This alone should make us cautious whenever we speak with certainty about beauty.
Because history suggests that taste is rarely fixed.
It evolves alongside culture, education and experience.
Perhaps this is why the eye must be educated before it can become discerning.
No one is born appreciating architecture. No one instinctively understands Japanese design, Renaissance painting or the construction of haute couture. These ways of seeing are cultivated slowly, through years of looking, reading, travelling, questioning and remaining curious. Taste is not inherited. It is accumulated.
The more deeply we engage with the world, the more nuanced our perception becomes.
And perhaps this is why taste has become increasingly difficult to develop today.
We live in a culture that rewards immediate judgment. Social media encourages us to decide within seconds whether something deserves our attention. Algorithms favour certainty over curiosity. We scroll past hundreds of images every day, making instantaneous decisions about what is beautiful, desirable or relevant before we have truly looked at any of them.
But taste has never been built through speed.
Taste asks us to slow down.
To remain with an object long enough for our first impression to give way to a deeper understanding. It asks us to replace certainty with curiosity. Instead of asking, Do I like this? it asks, What am I missing? Instead of assuming that our first reaction is our most truthful one, it reminds us that our first reaction is often simply our most familiar one.
This may be the greatest gift that taste offers us.
Not better clothes.
Not greater sophistication.
But greater humility.
Because the person with refined taste understands that they are still learning how to see. They recognise that every work of art, every building, every piece of music and every collection offers the possibility of expanding their perception rather than merely confirming what they already believe.
In this sense, taste reaches far beyond fashion.
It shapes the way we encounter ideas, cultures and even other people.
The ability to understand something before judging it is one of the rarest forms of generosity. It asks us to step outside ourselves, if only for a moment, and see the world through a perspective other than our own.
Perhaps that is what taste has always been.
Not a catalogue of things we like.
But a way of looking that remains curious enough to discover beauty where it had never thought to search.
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