Everyone needs inspiration: words, pictures, clothes, shops, people passing you on the street. When I’m on holiday I miss that inspiration. The kind that you seek out by visiting your favourite store; the kind that hits you from an unexpected billboard. It makes you excited about clothes again. Even if it’s only been a couple of days, the stimulation is refreshing, motivating.

Take us into your world

The most condensed form of such inspiration is probably found in magazines. Blogs approach it – I hope I provide something similar now and again on Permanent Style – but they don’t have the combination of writing and full-bleed images that can really spur desire. I hope, again, that The Rake sometimes elicits this response in readers.

But the greatest inspiration, for me, comes from brands that tell their story just right, with enough integrity, modesty and beauty to swallow you up inside their world. You don brand-tinted glasses. This is the power of brands, and the increasing effectiveness of this story-telling is why we live in such a branded world.

Take Hermès as an example. Playful, whimsical, full of colour and texture – they created a world long ago that distinguished them from po-faced, runway-stomping fashion houses. Their website dared to suggest that visiting ‘The world of Hermès’ was as important as shopping online. Others have since erected pale imitations, all advertising images and revolving logos. Hermès had a section comprising just the sounds of its various zips.

 

 

 

Hermès is also one of the few that publishes a good brand magazine. I say good, because it’s still not great. There will always be one photo shoot of leather grains or effervescent silks that inspire, but the writing is often a little stilted or over-florid. Most importantly of all, the text never seems to have been written by a fluent English speaker. It is a second-rate translation of the French.

 

It is perhaps unfair to highlight Hermès in this regard, because all brands do it. They invest millions in window dressing and PR agencies, but forget to pay the copywriter. Marketing materials can be terrible; in-house magazines are a little better; but the worst offender, by far, is the vanity book.

 

I have dozens of such books, sumptuous things filled with beautiful images. But the writing is terrible. This is a serious problem, because it stops you reading the book. Images and text work well together when you turn from one to the other: an alternating rhythm. Left with images alone, you flick through once and leave it to gather dust.

 

 

A noble exception was given to me recently: JM Weston by Didier van Cauwelaert. (The translator, too, deserves credit because the English is so readable: her name is Felicity Lang.) The book includes the history of the French shoemaker, details of the construction of its shoes, famous clients, tannery methods and personal anecdotes by the author, a novelist.

 

It is charmingly illustrated, the writing is good, and together they produce that precious swell of desire and inspiration. They make me want to dig out my bright-red Westons from the back of the closet, polish them up to a cricket-ball shine and wear them tomorrow.

 

Let this be an entreaty to luxury companies everywhere, forever obsessing over their brand and their image. We ask you, please: pay a good writer. Words are small, simple things but incredibly powerful. Use them to inspire us.