'ISTA'

If you pick up any magazine off the shelf these days I can guarantee that somewhere among one of the articles, or written across one of the pages, will be the words 'fashionista'! I don't really understand where this word has come from, but the fact that adding 'ista' to the end of a perfectly normal word qualifies it to be a national phenomenon is beyond me.

I remember in one of my lectures last year one of our tutors (who had previously given us a two hour lecture on how colour makes you feel) decided that this week was going to be on Grazia - one of the first magazines to start using the 'word'. My tutor loved it and managed to squeeze into every conversation and lecture since. Soon it seemed the word was everywhere!

I had finally accepted that perhaps a word was needed to describe a designer or a fashion devotee and that the word of choice was Fashionista. Until 'Recessionista' became the new word! Used to descibe a fashion lover who bargain hunts during the credit crunch and recession the word has worryingly started to catch on. The only good thing, in my opinion, that comes from the new 'ista' is that I now have a new most hated word.

Still...I plan to avoid using any kind of 'ista'...fashion or otherwise.