Page 30 - Sharp: The Book For Men SS21

JOSH GREENBLATT / EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
IHAVE ALWAYS LOVED STUFF. From browsing magazines (and the mall) for aviator sunglasses as a teenager to spending hours on the Internet looking for, well, new aviator sunglasses as an adult, I’ve been afflicted with a bad case of product lust for as long as I’ve had an allowance. The curse of consumerism, as any seasoned shopper knows, means the more you buy, the more you feel you need. But one day, you wake up and want to get rid of everything you own. How do you find a balance? How do you change your relationship to stuff?
Growing up a little bit and developing taste helps. Knowing what you like means you can buy that thing, not everything. Unfortunately, you don’t completely grow out of the need to buy. Not to retread familiar territory, but a year spent sitting with the stuff you have and questioning the need
for more is a solid, if scary, exercise in curbing the consumerist impulse. This leads back to my original question: what if the stuff you bought meant more to you, not less?
There’s a lot of “buy less but better” rhetoric, which feels at odds with the sheer amount of stuff being produced in the world today. So, how do you cut through the noise, free your brain (and wallet) from the algorithm, and buy with the intention to use and treasure? A car is meant to be driven, a watch to be worn. Beauty, craftsmanship, and storytelling are embedded in the stuff we buy — who made the thing, how it was made, and how we found it all help to imbue something with meaning. They’re how products become objects and things become pieces. They give your stuff a soul.
30 BFM / SS21 LETTER
PHOTO BY RENATA KAVEH. GROOMING BY NATE MATTHEW (P1M)