Taste is not an accident. It is not a matter of luck or having the right things at the right time. It is a discipline. A collection of small decisions that, over years, reveal something about the man making them.
No one is born knowing why one jacket looks better than another, why certain colors seem to belong together, or why something can be perfectly "correct" and still somehow feel wrong. We observe, imitate, get things wrong, and slowly begin to recognize what we once needed someone else to point out.
There is nothing wrong with imitation in the beginning. In fact, it may be necessary. Find men who dress well and study them. Look at old photographs. Notice the intentionality: the way their shirts fit, the knots of their ties, the way a jacket looks when the man is actually living in it rather than posing for a photograph. Learn the rules before becoming too eager to break them. At first, you borrow someone else's judgment because your own is still being formed. With enough attention, however, a noticeable shift occurs. You stop asking whether two things go together. You simply know when they do. What began as imitation becomes instinct of your own.
Interestingly, the better that instinct becomes, the less you seem to need. You stop mistaking expense for quality and novelty for style. You learn that a beautiful thing can still be the wrong thing, and that knowing what not to buy is as important as knowing what to buy. The wardrobe becomes quieter as you have become more accustomed to your style. The combinations become simpler. You begin dressing for the occasion rather than for the opportunity to be noticed. This may be the harder lesson in developing taste: discernment is not merely the ability to recognize what is good. It is the willingness to leave behind what does not belong. This particular quote is applicable to many things in life.
Eventually, the goal is not to think more about clothes, but to think about them less. To understand proportion, circumstance, and yourself well enough that getting dressed (or shopping) no longer feels like a challenge to overcome. The man who dresses well need not look as though he has spent the morning considering it. He simply looks appropriate to the life he is living. Perhaps that is when taste has finally become your own: when the rules are only those which you have created for yourself, your effort becomes seemingly invisible, and one day, without quite realizing when it happened, you are no longer learning how to dress. You are simply dressing like yourself.
“I learned early that imitation can be a superpower. Before I had success of my own, I learned how to look like I belonged in rooms with men who did. I imitated the way they dressed, the way they carried themselves, and the care with which they presented themselves to the world. Call it faking it if you like. People began treating me like the man I was presenting myself to be, and eventually, I learned how to become him.” - Mr. Shunney