Last September, the outside of Dongdaemun Design Plaza (DDP) was where the runway started before the show venue. The line to get in was long, and the end of the line was always filled with laughter from people who didn't have a ticket but just came to watch. Some people matched suits with sneakers, while others wore bold silhouettes, but their facial expressions were similar. “Can I become someone else for a moment today?” Same expression. I didn't like that question. Because everyday life generally requires us to live as just one person.

The reason fashion shows are amazing is not because the clothes are new, but because time is used in a new way. The movement is divided into seconds, the breath between rehearsal and the actual performance, the way the announcement “Starting soon” makes people sit quietly. We spend time on a daily basis, but most of the time we let it go. However, in a fashion show, time is ‘directed’. In that staged time, I remembered my day. A feeling of impatience to be on time for work, a habit of preparing an apology in advance for fear of being late for an appointment. The fashion show spoke to me in a strange way. “The way you handle time ultimately makes you who you are.”

It was dark inside the show, and the darkness made people stand out. A darkness that makes you put aside your job, age, and brand for a moment. And when the music came on, only then did each person’s ‘taste’ come to the fore. The moment the first look comes out, I always think the same thing. Clothes are not carried alone. The tailor's hands, the designer's persistence, the pattern maker's calculations, the heat of the steam iron, the model's breathing, and the angle of the hair and makeup team's wrists—all overlap to form one person's steps. When I look at it, I feel a little ashamed of the scenes in my life where I insist that I did it on my own.

Before the performance started, I happened to briefly pass by the backstage. It was the other side of glamour—but it was a real stage that made glamor possible. The hangers were crowded, clothes had name tags on them, and someone was ripping off the tape and someone was looking for a needle. What was most impressive was the presence of the safety pin. Even though the look looked like a neat finished product, there was actually a moment where he was leaning on a safety pin for a moment. The small, cheap piece of metal seemed to say, “It has to stay together like this for now.” I stored that scene in my mind for a long time. Because I too have added a day as a temporary measure countless times. Pretending to be a perfectly prepared person, in reality, I have barely buttoned my heart with one small pin.

From that day on, I changed my mind about ‘completion’. Completion does not always come with an elegant ending. Sometimes it starts with temporarily fixing something and holding on for the next moment. The reason there is no shame in safety pins is because they are not the end product, but rather a device that sustains the process. We need such devices in our lives too. It's not a perfect schedule, but a little device that helps me get back on track when I suddenly fall apart. For me, sometimes it's a line of a note, sometimes it's a window seat at my favorite cafe, and sometimes it's a sentence that says, "That's enough for today."

The recent landscape surrounding fashion shows increasingly focuses on ‘stories outside the clothes’. In some seasons, everyday objects such as aprons become the centerpiece of the runway, and in other seasons, a small pin appears with a social message. It was unfamiliar at first. Why does fashion bring up stories like this? But I soon understood. Clothes are the closest language to the body, so they reflect the times first. What we wear all day, the choices we make unconsciously, the things we adjust in anticipation of how others view them—all of them embody politics and labor, class and gender, anxiety and desire. A fashion show may be an event that brings those ‘unconscious choices’ under the spotlight and turns them into questions.

Another fun thing is the sense of desperation that comes after the show ends. The applause is short, people are on their phones again, and it's still busy outside. Even if you feel like you just saw something amazing, when you get home, you have to run the washing machine and separate the waste. But that sense of desolation is actually good. The feeling of a moment of art breaking through everyday life and then seeping back into daily life. On days when I watch a fashion show, my hands feel a little different when I open my closet. Instead of thinking, “When did I buy these clothes?”, I think, “What kind of person will I become when I wear these clothes?” In the end, clothes are a tool to decorate myself and a record of how I treat myself.

I looked at the backs of people in front of DDP and leaving the show for a while. Some people tensed their shoulders as if they had interpreted the silhouette they had just seen in their own way, while others adjusted the hem of their plain coat and made an expression that said, “But I am still me.” They were both cool. What the fashion show taught us is that fashion is not an answer but an attempt. It's not about copying someone else's look, but experimenting with a shape that suits my body and my day. An experiment that can fail.

So these days, I consciously create runway in small parts of my life. Go to work 3 minutes early and walk slowly around the block. Try adding a color that you normally wouldn't choose to a shirt. Instead of judging someone's words right away, try 'fitting' them for a moment. Is this an idea that suits me, or is it an idea that I insist is cool even though it is uncomfortable? The fashion show didn't give me much courage. Instead, it gave a very specific feeling. The sense that “I can get through today with just one small fixture” and the sense that “I am already a little different while trying.”

Sometimes we wait only for the ‘main performance’ on the stage of life. I will live a great life only after I become successful, after I have enough time, and after I become perfect. But what I see backstage always says. The main performance is short-lived, and most of it is time for preparation, repairs, and fixing. So, if there is a feeling I have attached with a safety pin today, it is not a shabby temporary thing, but a technology that makes the next scene possible. Just as wrinkles remain on clothes even after a fashion show, small resolutions of the day also remain as wrinkles somewhere on my body. And I choose not to iron out those wrinkles. Those wrinkles are proof that I was ‘alive and moving.’