Ashante K. Charles
Professor: Miles Strucker
Tuesday, April 30rd, 2019
Integrative Seminar: Visual Culture
Fast Fashion Industry, Indie Designers and Traditionalists:
Reforming The Laws of Fashion
The practice of imitation is a culture in the fashion industry. It has become a common exercise of fast fashion retailers to appropriate the designs of artists while legal protection is often limited and costly for whom creative property is tampered. With subtle and bold fabrications of designs appearing on the runway, clothing racks and mannequins, the fashion industry as we know has established the influence of creativity with no regards to boundaries. A large population of the fashion industry is lacking originality, as cultural sampling has evolved into a partially grey area. This paper will emphasize the tensions between originality and appropriation in fashion culture in light of intellectual property.
Over the years, several accusations and lawsuits were made against fast fashion retailers: Forever 21, Topshop, Zara, and H&M, for imitating prestigious fashion labels and indie designers. The successful fast fashion brand Fashion Nova is popularly known for their frequent replications of newly showcased garments, striking weekly sales and media attention. The goal in retail is to seek out trends and translate them into a style that represents the brand and introduce to the media for the masses in prospective clients and customers; however, Fashion Nova’s fabrications are boldly perceptible, making their reputation in the fashion industry unfavorable; however consumers outweigh the volume of bad press due to potential profits. Indeed, their goal is to offer customers with affordable clothing while following trends consistently, though Fashion Nova is absent of ingenuity as they profit out of a wide consumer base who seek for fashion-forward and inexpensive in the same category. High fashion has since become easily accessible at an attainable price, and with fast fashion’s sustained viability, the unending demand for less bank-breaking alternatives will progress.
In defense of the fashion community’s quality and artistry, social media’s heat on runway and celebrity imagery has emerged the creation of fashion blogs. One notable account identified as Diet Prada helmed by the previously anonymous duo, Tony Liu and Lindsey Schuyler, has established a platform to generate a voice for fashion critique insiders. Diet Prada has developed a conversation to manifest against imitators in the fashion industry by exposing the origin of designs and the fabrication created by fashion designers to the media. Fashion Nova’s rank in the fashion industry is unfavorable from a response by Diet Prada, British Magazine I-D reported under Diet Prada’s insight that the brand was frequently imitating garments that were revealed to the public eye on celebrities simultaneously, the media raised questions as this occurrence caused suspicion on their calculated scheme of fabrications.
Surprisingly fast fashion labels are not the only copyists, there’s a spotlight on high fashion designers who reproduce the work of others subsequently. Designers continue to neglect any credit of other designers as a source of inspiration for designs. The Off-White streetwear brand founded by Virgil Abloh was accused of being a copier of the independent label colrsbaby owned by Zec Merié. Based on the colrsbaby trench coat design, Off-White replicated and showcased the garment at their menswear fall/winter 2019-2020 fashion show. As a designer Virgil Abloh has been accused several times of imitating the style of other designers; however, generally, the work he produces is influenced by imitation in his own style and language. In an article written by Garage magazine, the report analyzes Virgil Abloh’s appropriations throughout his career. Abloh’s design strategy is said to insinuate the who-did-it-first attitude of “previous generations in favor of the copy-paste logic of the internet and its inhabitants.” Abloh’s title as a designer has been renowned for his persistent sampling, while he applies his design method from Marcel Duchamp. American sculptor and painter Marcel Duchamp was an artist noted for his conceptual art in which cultivated the idea of redefined works of art. Virgil uses “Duchamp is my lawyer,” to define his work. This Duchamp card he takes advantage of, allows him to utilize pre-existing material and content in his favor. In December 2015, the New York Times reported a collection of pieces from Chanel resembling a set of sweaters crafted by Scotland designer Mati Ventrillon from her series of knitted garments. The knitted garments were said to have been bought by Chanel for inspiration, with no intention of copying, however, Mati’s craftsmanship was not attributed to Chanel’s downright sampling in the end. This generation seeks for vintage clothing and accessories as the old-fashioned re-emerges, and through this revival, various brands supplement traditional old school designs to be reintroduced in this era. For instance, in 1994 Turkish designer, Rifat Ozbek, debuted a pair of glittering glasses and handkerchief-style rhinestone necklace in spring/summer 1995, this year Los Angeles based designer, Michael Ngo created an identical model of the crystallized accessories.
In the United States, copyright protection merely exists in the fashion industry. As consumerism is a huge part of American culture, it is unlikely this alternating cycle will cease reproduction, and the protection of the fashion community will remain limited. Julie Zerbo a lawyer, initiated the launch of the blog The Fashion Law as the founder and editor-in-chief since 2012. The Fashion Law serves as a legal lens in the fashion industry and essential guide for aspiring designers to learn how to safeguard their work, in addition to The Fashion Law(s) purpose, “the website started because I wanted to supplement my straightforward, black letter legal education with things that were going on in the fashion industry.” In an interview with the Huffington Post, Julie Zerbo presents insight on the circumstances that yield in intellectual property within the fashion industry. In the world of fashion, copyright laws are seemingly narrow as it does not find it imperative to “…provide exclusive rights for inherently useful items,” Zerbo uncovers. Garments and accessories are typically considered “useful items”… because bags allow us to carry things and dresses cover our bodies.” With fashion copyright, there is a fine line between necessities and essential materials we possess, with that, it is difficult to designate what lies in between.
In conclusion, Art is either plagiarism or revolution,” in the words of Marcel Duchamp. In the fashion community, vigilance must ensue with respect to the intellectual property of all artists and that of the artists own. Since fashion is built in between imitation and influence, reformation must be established as fashion integrity. It is detrimental to emerging independent labels to build their brand with no defense against copyists in terms of funding and ranking in the industry. Fast Fashion imitates High Fashion and they jointly appropriate indie designers and gain profit while the craft of Indie designers is devalued. Holding a 2.4 trillion dollars worth, how can we continue to fuel this empire since, “without copying, the fashion industry would be smaller, weaker and less powerful,” law professor at New York University, Christopher Sprigman, comments. One question we must ask ourselves is, how can we reform the laws to protect upcoming designers? Fast fashion benefits on consumers on a budget by boldly sampling high fashion designs and small fashion businesses, High fashion houses take advantage of their money and power to imitate indie designers and in the end, traditionalists benefit greatly from promoting innovation. Collectively, the complexity of these laws is settled on our ability to take initiative and collaborate. Credit should be taken gravely and or any form of compensation, this would only take effect promptly if we acknowledge the influence of our roles as creators and innovators. Withal, almost all creativity is a result of uncredited influence, it is important that we designate ourselves outside appropriation, and consider the thin line of legalities within our work in the fashion industry that expands on imitation.
SOURCES
Bromwich, Jonah Engel. “We’re All Drinking Diet Prada Now.” The New York Times. March 14, 2019. Accessed April 20, 2019. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/14/fashion/diet-prada.html.
Delistraty, Cody. “The Endless Appropriations of Virgil Abloh.” Garage. January 21, 2018. Accessed April 20, 2019. https://garage.vice.com/en_us/article/paq4p7/appropriations-virgil-abloh.
“Here’s How Brands Like H&M Get Away With Copying Other Designers.” Google. Accessed April 20, 2019. https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.huffpost.com/entry/fast-fashion-copycats_n_5b8967f9e4b0511db3d7def6/amp.
Holmes, Elizabeth. “So *This* Is How Fashion Nova Turned Around Those Kardashian Looks So Fast.” Cosmopolitan. November 08, 2018. Accessed April 20, 2019. https://www.cosmopolitan.com/style-beauty/fashion/a23555906/fashion-nova-kylie-jenner-knockoff-clothing/.”Imitation in Fashion Is a Huge Problem, But It’s Probably Not Going Anywhere.” Google. Accessed April 20, 2019. https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.teenvogue.com/story/fashion-law-interview-imitation-in-fashion-problem/amp.
Ssense. “Julie Zerbo Vs. Fake News.” Ssense. October 23, 2017. Accessed April 22, 2019. https://www.ssense.com/en-us/editorial/fashion/julie-zerbo-vs-fake-news.
Sunnucks, Jack. “Diet Prada Allege Kim Kardashian Is in League with Fashion Nova.” I. February 19, 2019. Accessed April 20, 2019. https://i-d.vice.com/en_us/article/xwbv53/diet-prada-kim-kardashian-fashion-nova.
Tfl. “Is Virgil Abloh on His Way to Gaining Exclusive Rights in His Use of Quotes?” The Fashion Law. September 26, 2017. Accessed April 22, 2019. http://www.thefashionlaw.com/home/is-virgil-abloh-on-his-way-to-gaining-exclusive-rights-in-his-use-of-quotes.
Tfl. “Fashion Nova Wants to “Dissolve the Perceived Separation Between” High Fashion and Mass Market.” The Fashion Law. November 01, 2018. Accessed April 20, 2019. http://www.thefashionlaw.com/home/fashion-nova-wants-to-dissolve-the-perceived-separation-between-high-fashion-and-mass-market.
“VIRGIL ABLOH: “Duchamp Is My Lawyer”.” 032c. Accessed April 20, 2019. https://032c.com/duchamp-is-my-lawyer-virgil-abloh.
