"There has been a change in men's attitudes toward their clothes. Men are more aware of fashion; they're not afraid of it"
About this Quote
The subtext sits in that loaded phrase “not afraid of it.” Fear is the real subject here, not fabric. For decades, men were trained to treat fashion as a threat: to authenticity, to seriousness, to heterosexual credibility. Klein’s genius was to sell minimalism and sex appeal as “clean” and “modern,” a way to participate in fashion without seeming vain or flamboyant. In other words, he offers a safe on-ramp to self-curation.
Context matters: Klein comes up in the late 20th-century American brand boom, when designers became lifestyle authors and advertising learned to talk in desire, not product features. His campaigns didn’t just reflect changing attitudes; they helped manufacture them, pairing pared-down silhouettes with maximal cultural heat. The quote doubles as consumer anthropology and sales strategy: if men aren’t afraid anymore, they’ll experiment, upgrade, repeat. Klein isn’t pleading for men to care; he’s announcing that caring is now part of what a confident man looks like.
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Citation Formats
APA Style (7th ed.)
Klein, Calvin. (2026, January 18). There has been a change in men's attitudes toward their clothes. Men are more aware of fashion; they're not afraid of it. FixQuotes. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/there-has-been-a-change-in-mens-attitudes-toward-13468/
Chicago Style
Klein, Calvin. "There has been a change in men's attitudes toward their clothes. Men are more aware of fashion; they're not afraid of it." FixQuotes. January 18, 2026. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/there-has-been-a-change-in-mens-attitudes-toward-13468/.
MLA Style (9th ed.)
"There has been a change in men's attitudes toward their clothes. Men are more aware of fashion; they're not afraid of it." FixQuotes, 18 Jan. 2026, https://fixquotes.com/quotes/there-has-been-a-change-in-mens-attitudes-toward-13468/. Accessed 12 Feb. 2026.









