Shades of blue: is it turquoise, lapis, or cerulean?

Cerulean


Lapis lazuli


Turquoise



From the script of "The Devil Wears Prada"

While preparing for a fashion show, Andy (fashion naive assistant to Amanda, The fashion Queen of the world) giggles when two very similar belts are considered very different by the fashion professionals. The ensuing dialogue is a masterpiece (A word by word transcription from the actual movie, by David Frankel - 2006):

AMANDA (Maryl Streep)
-Something funny?

ANDY (Anne Hathaway)
-No, no… it’s just that both those belts look exactly the same to me, at least. I’m just learning about this stuff.

AMANDA
-This stuff? Ohh! O.K. I see. You think that this has nothing to do with you. You go to your closet, and you select - I don’t know - that lumpy blue sweater, for instance, because you’re trying to tell the world that you take yourself too seriously too care about what you put on your back. But, what you don’t know is that that sweater is not just blue, it’s not turquoise, it’s not lapis, it’s actually cerulean. You’re also blithely unaware of the fact that in 2002 Oscar de la Renta did a collection of cerulean gowns; and then I think it was YSL, wasn’t he, who showed cerulean military jackets... And, then cerulean quickly showed up in the collections of eight different designers. And then filtered to department stores, and then trickled on down into some tragic casual corner where you, no doubt, fished it out from a clearance bin. However, that blue represents millions of dollars and countless jobs. And it’s sort of comical how you think you made a choice that exempts you from the fashion industry when, in fact, you are wearing a sweater that was selected to you by the people in this room, from a pile of stuff.

La reflexión de Amanda Priestly nos ilustra como hasta nuestro libre albedrío es, en realidad, una ilusión: de una forma u otra, muchas de nuestras elecciones son pre-establecidas por pequeños grupos de personas bien ubicadas: los tomadores de decisiones (decision-makers). La misma reflexión ilustra la cadena alimentaria que hay detrás de un simple sweater: los grandes diseñadores, los menores, las tiendas de cadena, los outlets... Todo el mundo está expuesto: los ricos, los pobres, los conscientes de la moda, los hippies, etc. El momento de impacto varía, pero virtualmente todos somos receptores de las "tendencias" de la moda - y de otras cosas - en algún momento. En vista de lo anterior, y paradógicamente, la única forma de liberarnos es a través del conocimiento: no escapamos cuando no le damos importancia, al contrario, sucumbimos con mayor facilidad. Si queremos recuperar la libertad tenemos que hacer el esfuerzo de entender. Otro ejemplo de cómo el conocimiento nos libera... And it is so much fun!

Compara el script original (tomado de la internet), con el final: la brillantez del producto terminado se parece al original tanto como un diamante precioso lo es de la piedra bruta que lo incluye.

La belleza está en los detalles, e importa en todo.