Garment Center photo by: Next week the fashion parade begins with designers presenting their collections for Spring 2011. And on September 10th, the public can participate in the festivities at Fashion’s Night Out.
But fashion’s paradox of the moment revolves around 2 contrasting philosophies either enticing shoppers to feast on the upcoming Fashion’s Night Out or fast, following the Six Items or Less experiment. Another influential group, The Great American Apparel Diet, is a reconsideration on consumerism and a movement to inspire thought about our consumption reflex habits, has attracted many followers. The contradiction is fascinating, especially designing future seasons that advocate newness and change. And the current economic reset underscores a move to frugality.
The rub between the dueling ideologies, you have to consider that a collection to be thought of as “successful” is required to sell-thru within 2-3 weeks making room for the next group to refresh the floor. But over the past 2 years, predicting Wall Street’s future influencing the shopper’s mood, has made it increasingly challenging to designers and retailers envisioning the next season. Creatively, we’re motivated by impulse, and “retail therapy” can give us a shot of dopamine, but, now, we’re gaining more control or responsibility with credit habits slowing demand in all retail channels.
Enter “slow” fashion. The “slow” fashion movement can be thought of as a reaction to the “fast” fashion that has dominated the malls and avenues. Quick, usually imported designs produced inexpensively have replaced wardrobes weekly. However, these impulse buys made from synthetic cloth are sometimes quickly discarded filling landfills instead of re-purposed for raw material. Throughout the evolution of my design blog Sparked.biz, I’ve written about the ecological influence for fashion and recently shared a thought provoking show at Pratt’s Manhattan Gallery ETHICS + AESTHETICS = SUSTAINABLE. Beyond the scope of environmentally friendly manufacturing, fashion devotees advocate fair trade practices and slowing down fashion’s cycle.
One of the more interesting events in the packed Fashion’s Night Out schedule is presented by Brooklyn’s Textile Arts Center and Ecouterre.com. From 6pm to 11pm, the evening will define the “slow” fashion movement with guest panelists, do-it-yourself workshops and of course, shopping, but sustainably!
