The Journey

<The finale of the Wooyoungmi show>

It is easy to lose sight of why you are doing what you are doing. Sometimes, you feel downtrodden along the way, too. Whenever that feeling of inertia sinks in, I read my personal statement that I submitted for law school to remind me of the purpose of this journey.

"Come back in an hour or two. After seating guests with exclusive invitations, we will see if we can accommodate you," said a staff member guarding the entrance at Le Palais de Tokyo, a modern art gallery. So I plopped down on the nearest bench with my now cold cup of cappuccino and waited for two hours wrapped up in excitement.

I was a 20-year-old, on a month-long sojourn in Paris for the sole purpose of visiting art galleries and artisanal ateliers. On my daily coffee stroll that morning, I had noticed a group of stylish models chatting nearby Le Palais. I rushed into the gallery after learning from a passerby that Wooyoungmi, a Seoul-based menswear brand, would be showcasing its latest collection at the venue in a few hours. Throughout my two-hour wait on that bench, it never dawned on me that the guard had no intention of letting in an uninvited fashion admirer; his response had been merely given out of politeness. Upon seeing me returning to him, the guard let out an exasperated sigh, which clearly communicated his disbelief at my naïveté. Suddenly my eyes welled up with tears. At that very moment, a Korean staff member, who had been watching the entire episode, came to my side and walked me to the room where the prelude song was setting an upbeat mood, signaling the impending start of the show. My heart was pounding - I was at a fashion show in Paris! Even the guests’ whispers seemed to me like a part of the show. That day, I saw, with my own eyes, wide pants billowing rhythmically in the air, models donned in exquisite looks exuding confidence in every step, and, most importantly and touchingly, the designer shedding tears for those who came to appreciate her sartorial creations. I, for one, was the recipient of those grateful tears. Of course, I was not seated and had to tiptoe to secure an unblocked view of the performance. Yet, no words could remotely capture the thrill I experienced that day.

A couple of weeks after returning to Seoul, I encountered an article in The Economist, which described how Louboutin, a high-end French footwear company, sued Yves Saint Laurent, another French luxury clothing firm, for trademark infringement. Louboutin claimed that YSL was using without permission a red color that Louboutin alleged it created after extensive R&D. Deeply intrigued by the nature of the allegation, I shared the story with my friends. Yet, I can still vividly recollect the uninterested glances they threw back at my face. Most of the responses I received were along the lines of “There are much more important things in life. Does that even merit our attention?” However, I had witnessed my designer friends staying up several nights to design the simplest of T-shirts with unique silhouettes. I knew that fashion labels such as Chanel and Dior invest a huge sum of money just to invent a new color palette. In The Devil Wears Prada, Andrea, a neophyte intern at Vogue tells Miranda, magazine’s editor-in-chief, who is deliberating which belt to match with her dress, that both blue belts look exactly the same, a remark that infuriates all the people in the room. Miranda drives home the point that a group of designers and colorists made these seemingly same-looking blue colors with an unbelievable amount of time and effort so that the public could enjoy a richer selection of colors.

This passionate response is the reason why I want to study and practice law in the fashion industry. I deeply care about designers who intensely channel their energy to offer their clients and the world a more colorful life, and I strongly believe that such serious efforts merit an array of legal protections afforded by copyright, trademark, and patent laws in their own right. My passion for fashion, and, extendedly, intellectual property law, is therefore grounded firmly in my love of art and humanistic ideas behind it. The public is understandably not given the occasion to experience firsthand that fashion, like all art, can be a sartorial representation of ideas that designers hold dearly and love to share with the rest of the world. I find that there is much interpretation in a fashion show, just as in the analytical interpretation of legal texts. Having savored various genres of literature, learned new languages and different cultures, and enjoyed being immersed in philosophical contemplation, I welcome the chance to expose myself to law, which, in my opinion, is an interesting concoction of literary pieces, linguistic nuances, and philosophical meditations. In this light, my three years of studying law will be, though admittedly strenuous, gratifying - just as my wait in front of that Paris fashion show was. It is a pleasant challenge I am willing to take on in order to fully appreciate what is to come after my law studies.

At the end of the three-year journey, I will not be crafting couture dresses in an atelier like Karl Lagerfeld, the head designer of Chanel, or setting new season’s trends in a fancy office like Anna Wintour, the editor-in-chief of Vogue. However, armed with the knowledge and skills necessary to provide artists and their creations with appropriate legal protections, I can help ensure that they are fully credited for their creative works of art. I will go to bed every night, knowing that I had spent the day contributing to the creation of a world in which art can be truly realized and is free to prosper. That feeling, I know for sure, will be unsurpassed like the exhilaration I relished when I was clapping thunderously at that Paris fashion show.