There was a time when clothing was expected to last—not as an aesthetic choice, but as a fact of life. A jacket was repaired because it had to be. A dress was altered because the fabric was precious, and memory more so. Fashion, before it became an industry addicted to velocity, understood wear as evidence of living. The modern marketplace taught us otherwise. It taught us to fear frayed hems, to disguise mending, to equate worth with the untouched. In doing so, it severed clothing from time.