Contemporary luxury in Russia - a whim or a lifestyle?

The modern world is mired in expensive cars, luxurious apartments, three-story dachas and branded clothing. There are almost no "clean" souls left who would not dream of a house on Rublevka and a Ferrari under the window. The consumer society holds firmly in its arms.

At one time, the American professor Bernard Dubois defined the concept of luxury as follows:

"This is something that is expensive, and that, from a practical point of view, you do not need (gifts do not count)."

That is, people buy luxury goods for completely different reasons:

• someone wants to demonstrate status (psychologists call this conspicuous consumption - "conspicuous spending", and psychologists - "conspicuous consumption")
• someone cheers themselves up in this way
• but someone just wants to

The first is incomprehensible to me personally - because I do not see the connection between achievements (personal, financial, etc.) and the cost of an item. Anyway, it looks more like a cheap show-off.

And some have to adapt to the opinion of society in this regard. For example, if a successful art director hasn’t bought a mega-fancy iPhone that has not yet gone on sale, he will simply not be understood. Yes, yes, and such stereotypes are common.

Although to be honest,

price is not a guarantor of real luxury

Quite recently I read about a domestic fashion designer (unfortunately, I don't remember the name). So he very skillfully used the stereotype: expensive is cool.

He sells clothes, the cost of which is about 2,000 rubles, 30 (!) Times more expensive. That is, he puts out a price tag of 60,000 rubles for the thing that, in fact, is not worth that kind of money by definition.
And he does not complain about the demand, because the people get high when they pay immeasurable money.

This is how strong the common man's craving for luxury is. Everyone wants to feel like kings and queens. This is what I attribute to a whim.

But all this, of course, is nonsense compared to real branded things like Bentley or Rolix. Yes, you have to pay for quality and brand. But you can pay if you can, right?

And this is already a lifestyle. Because, for example, the English queen cannot afford to dress in the Cherkizovsky market. Even if he wants to. The status does not allow.

That is, this

not luxury for the sake of luxury - just a different standard of living

And, as it seems to me, only those who from childhood are accustomed to the highest quality in everything will be able to live easily and naturally in such an environment.

If you give all this to a person who has grasped the luxury of what is called "from rags to riches" - a real vanity fair begins. I notice this sin for so many public people. And it's not very pleasant to look at them. Because luxury grows into excesses.

Wandering around the Internet, I somehow came across a photo of cars. And one of them had the following signature:

"One of 5,000 cars of the Arab sheikh (name)."

I'm curious, did he ride each of them at least once? :) I just figured out right away how many years he would need to ride each one, if he would spend only 1 day on one.

It turned out that almost 14 years. Not bad, huh? I drove this on a brand new Ferrari, then I remembered about it about 5 years later, and said: "Oh, I haven't ridden my red Ferrari for a long time ... probably 5 years have passed ... this annoying omission must be corrected!"

Both laughter and sin.

And this is what happens - even the lifestyle is not immune from excesses. And luxury goods attract both the poor and the rich. What to do - everyone wants to touch the best. The main thing is not to forget about the soul in this whole extravaganza of diamonds, brands, platinum credit cards and the race "who has more".