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A Good Look: 15 Creatives Solving The Fashion World’s Problems
Slide Nr 1Fashion is fun! Fashion also plays an important role in society, the global economy and individual expression. It influences how we position ourselves in the world and how we perceive others. The following designers, entrepreneurs and fashion insiders are using the power of fashion to tackle the industry’s biggest problems, and turning gender equality, diversity and sustainability into this season’s hottest trends. [Photo: Wildfang]
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A Good Look: 15 Creatives Solving The Fashion World’s Problems.
Slide Nr 2You know the drill: Clothes for little girls are pink and have flowers, butterflies and pictures of princesses on them. Little boys get blue outfits with cars, dinosaurs and robots. While arguably reductive on both counts, the fashion industry does a particular disservice to girls by rarely offering empowering messages or practical items to run around and explore the world in. The independent childrenswear companies behind Clothes Without Limits “challenge gender clichés in children’s clothing to […] show them who they can be.”
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A Good Look: 15 Creatives Solving The Fashion World’s Problems.
Slide Nr 3Princess Awesome, for example, fights gender stereotyping with a range of practical and pretty dresses featuring trains, planes, automobiles… and many other designs traditionally reserved for boys. They even have collections dedicated to maths and science, for that aspiring female STEM geek in your life. They acknowledge that boys deserve more diverse options, too, but – as they say – “we had to start somewhere”, and that somewhere was “a gaping hole in the marketplace”.
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A Good Look: 15 Creatives Solving The Fashion World’s Problems.
Slide Nr 4While gender stereotyping in children’s clothing is most often seen as limiting for girls, the tables are turned once those girls grow up. Fashion for adults offers a much wider range of options for women and precious few alternatives for men. Many collections classed as unisex, genderless or intersectional focus on reclaiming traditional signifiers of women’s style for menswear. New York indie darling Vaquera, for example, designs frilly, flouncy, sparkly skirts, dresses and onesies for men and/or women, or anyone in between.
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A Good Look: 15 Creatives Solving The Fashion World’s Problems.
Slide Nr 5Gender fluidity, gender-neutral, unisex: Call it what you want, non-gendered fashion is having a moment. From big catwalk names like JW Anderson, to high street stores like Zara, the industry is beginning to explore the possibilities of fashion that isn’t made strictly for one half (give or take) of humanity. Others embrace the concept more fully, like Jordanian-Syrian-Canadian designer Rad Hourani, who creates beautiful, highly covetable and totally wearable fashion for anyone who feels like wearing it.
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A Good Look: 15 Creatives Solving The Fashion World’s Problems.
Slide Nr 6While women do have a wider choice of styles, brands and shops, those looking for clothes that aren’t traditionally feminine are short of convenient shopping options. US retailer Wildfang caters specifically to tomboys, i.e. female-identifying individuals who may previously have turned to menswear because they don’t feel comfortable in “girly” clothes. The Wildfang stores (both online and offline) sell a variety of looks by a wide range of brands, but all provide male-style fashion staples, designed to fit a female form. (Intrigued? Check out our interview with Wildfang founder Emma McIlroy.)
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A Good Look: 15 Creatives Solving The Fashion World’s Problems.
Slide Nr 7Taking inspiration from and reinterpreting historical, traditional and multicultural influences is an essential part of fashion design. However, there’s a fine line between inspiration and cultural appropriation, and designers have time and again proven themselves inept at walking that line. Instead of paying for a “Western” interpretation of “ethnic” designs, culturally sensitive consumers can seek out those perpetuating a sartorial tradition, reinterpreting the styles of their own communities and keeping alive artisanal skills passed along within families. For example, Native American fashion shop Beyond Buckskin can help you accessorise for festival season without buying into “Cowboys and Indians” clichés.
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A Good Look: 15 Creatives Solving The Fashion World’s Problems.
Slide Nr 8Alternatively, support Western labels who walk the walk and trade inspiration for participation, like Harare NY. Designer Caroline Fuss travels to countries like Guatemala, Sri Lanka and India, works with local artisans and incorporates their work into her designs. She builds long-term relationships with weavers, batik experts and crocheters, enabling them to keep alive unique skills and traditions, and credits them with influencing and shaping her collections.
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A Good Look: 15 Creatives Solving The Fashion World’s Problems.
Slide Nr 9Being racially colour blind is usually perceived as positive, but not when it comes to the fashion industry’s blind spot for people of colour. Case in point: The word “nude” in fashionspeak refers to a light shade of pink. Needless to say, the skin tone of a majority of the world’s population looks nothing like what fashion sells as nude. Enter ethical fashion label Naja’s Nude for All, a collection of undergarments designed to match a variety of nude skin tones.
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A Good Look: 15 Creatives Solving The Fashion World’s Problems.
Slide Nr 10(Lack of) diversity is hardly an issue unique to the fashion industry, but as a trade that influences beauty standards and perceptions of what is deemed desirable, it should be held to a higher standard. Consumers of fashion designed in New York, London, Milan and Paris increasingly live outside the Western fashion capitals, so showing collections almost exclusively on thin, white models makes less sense by the season. Online publication The Fashion Spot keeps tabs on diversity on runways and in magazines.
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A Good Look: 15 Creatives Solving The Fashion World’s Problems.
Slide Nr 11When it comes to lack of diverse bodies in magazines, fashion editors have the excuse that sample garments come in sample sizes – and one (small) size has to fit all (skinny) models. The power to change that lies with designers and fashion brands, who are slowly but surely coming round to the realisation that it pays to show clothes on models customers can relate to. Cool-girl treasure trove Modcloth is one of the labels leading the way with models of all shapes, reflecting the wide range of sizes available on their site.
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A Good Look: 15 Creatives Solving The Fashion World’s Problems.
Slide Nr 12Two years ago, the fashion industry reached what may just be peak ableism by putting fashion model Kylie Jenner on a magazine cover – accessorised with a wheelchair. The backlash was instant, drawing attention to the fact that A) a wheelchair is not a fashion statement, and B) the fashion industry doesn’t cater to actual wheelchair users particularly well. A select few adaptive fashion labels, like Chairmelotte Wheelchair Couture and ABL Denim, are picking up the slack by making clothing tailored to the needs of wheelchair users.
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A Good Look: 15 Creatives Solving The Fashion World’s Problems.
Slide Nr 13Artificial limbs have received the fashion treatment more often and more successfully, most famously with a hand-carved prosthetic leg designed by Alexander McQueen and worn by athlete Aimee Mullins on the catwalk in 1999. Although strikingly beautiful prosthetics and covers are available from several brands (see Alleles and The Alternative Limb Project) and the running blades made famous by Paralympians also lend themselves to a fashionable aesthetic, differently abled models are still the exception on runways, in fashion editorials and advertising. [Photo: The Alternative Limb Project]
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A Good Look: 15 Creatives Solving The Fashion World’s Problems.
Slide Nr 14Seemingly flawless fashion models represent a very specific, extremely narrow definition of physical beauty – one that many women feel they should aspire to. Fashion designer Carrie Hammer designs clothes for real women and wanted to show her designs on the strong, accomplished, smart women she envisaged wearing them. She founded Role Models Not Runway Models to encourage other fashion brands to follow her lead and make their runways and ad campaigns more diverse – giving women more to aspire to than the typical model look.
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A Good Look: 15 Creatives Solving The Fashion World’s Problems.
Slide Nr 15When it comes to food, some consumers reject animal products purely for ethical reasons, choosing to avoid animal cruelty in favour of plant-based alternatives. Yet cruelty-free fashion isn’t the norm, even among vegetarians. There are, however, other reasons to ditch leather and other by-products of the meat industry. Vegan fashion labels (check out Bead and Reel and Modavanti) are increasingly highlighting sustainability, reusing and recycling fibres and fabrics – making them a choice that isn’t just better for animals, but also for our planet and its resources. [Photos: Bead and Reel]
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A Good Look: 15 Creatives Solving The Fashion World’s Problems.
Slide Nr 16One to watch: Circularity is still a utopian concept, but one that harbours the potential to solve several problems at once. A truly circular fashion industry would require less resources, produce less waste and make sustainable fashion more affordable. Ina Budde, a Berlin-based fashion designer and design school lecturer, has founded sustainable design consultancy Design for Circularity to speed up the arrival of that utopian future.
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A Good Look: 15 Creatives Solving The Fashion World’s Problems.
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