While externally, the luxury landscape has thankfully changed in many positive ways, the internal reason why people buy luxury goods remains the same. As Founder of The Psychology of Fashion, Anabel Maldonado has set her sights on understanding why we covet what we do. A fashion journalist and psychologist, here she explores the relationship between personality and purchase and where sustainability fits in. There is really only one central reason why people buy luxury goods: to self-actualise. All other reported reasons are just by-products of self-actualisation. But what is self-actualisation? Notable psychologist Abraham Maslow explicitly defines it to be “the desire for self-fulfillment, namely the tendency for the individual to become actualised in what he is potentially. This tendency might be phrased as the desire to become more and more what one is, to become everything that one is capable of becoming.” In other words, to be more of your best self. Its why we normally refer to luxury products and experiences as “aspirational”. We aspire to have it because we aspire to be a more evolved version of who we are today and a tangible reminder helps us get there. Luxury goods essentially help us self-actualise in two ways: through promoting emotional self-protection, and fostering our true identities. The...