Maori All Blacks Store<\/a><\/p>\n\nAs a trend consultant she insists from the outset, as if to apologise:
\n“I love fashion. Passionately”. She did not really need to remind us
\nof that: Time Magazine did not name her as one of the 25 most
\ninfluential people in fashion for nothing in 2008. Today it is
\nuniversally agreed that everyone takes note of what Lidewij Edelkoort
\nhas to say: the success, never disputed, of her reviews View on Colour
\nand Bloom bears witness to the richness of her creative suggestions.
\nHer trend brochures aimed at the fashion and textile, design, interior
\ndesign, and beauty and well-being industries are distributed around
\nthe world. <\/p>\n
“Our ‘fashion system’ is completely obsolete”<\/h2>\n
\nShe goes on to say “I love fashion, yet I could not have not written
\nthis text entitled ‘Anti-fashion.’ This professional manifesto finds
\nthat fashion has undergone a radical change rendering the current
\n‘fashion system’ completely obsolete.” This starts with education.
\n“Fashion schools and colleges continue to teach young students to
\nbecome catwalk designers, divas. They keep on being led to believe
\nthat what awaits them is a life of fame outside of the rules. In other
\nwords schools are continuing to teach the principle of unsociable
\nindividuality to young people whose environment, in these days of
\nsocial networks, is based on sharing and creating together. In
\nreality, training in fashion has gone out of fashion.” <\/p>\n
“A world with no interest in textiles” <\/h2>\n
\nThe forecaster emphasises that “for the first time in its history
\nfashion, supposedly ahead of the times, it is unable to react to the
\nperiod.” Students are being taught to become little Karls, to create
\nclothes, bags, all sorts of accessories for others, to arrange the
\nshow, brochures, communications and photography – all in three years.
\nAnd during these three years, little time ends up being dedicated to
\nclothes, which are just one element among many.” <\/p>\n
\nThe situation of the studios, sacrificed on the altar of
\nglobalisation, makes it even more difficult to teach techniques: “this
\nnow leads to fashion designers being trained who are not familiar with
\nfabric, who do not know how textiles work or how fibres react. Soon we
\nwill only know poplin and the jersey for the rest of our lives. It’s
\nterrifying.” Hence the interest, in passing, in offering her clients a
\nnew course of studies allowing a better understanding of the
\nmechanisms inherent to the season’s fabrics. <\/p>\n
\nThe press also receives a dressing down with scathing remarks about
\nthe lack of general education of fashion editors: “We have seen, for
\nexample, in major magazines such as Vogue or Marie-Claire triumphant
\nannouncements rejoicing in the return of prints. Do your homework
\nmadam editors and stop talking about prints when what is meant is
\nactually jacquard.” <\/p>\n
\nThe rest of the manifesto is in the same vein: public opinion needs to
\nbe made aware of the fact that cheaper clothes (ludicrously, now
\ncopying the luxury brands) manufactured in countries where the
\nworkforce is exploited have blood on their hands; the resulting loss
\nof interest in local know-how, the irresponsible attitude of the media
\nin advocating never wearing the same outfit twice as a panacea; the
\nfact that designers are pushed by marketing to henceforth regard
\nclothing as just an accessory to other accessories such as bags and
\nshoes. <\/p>\n
\n“When you add them up there are no longer any creators really creating
\nfashion. To put it simply, this is because marketing has killed the
\nfashion industry by over-exploiting it, by subjecting designers to
\nunbelievable stress (they have to do everything) and where their
\noriginality is sacrificed in the constant quest for the slogan, by
\nsaturating the market with products made to create nice images
\ndesigned to be ‘liked’ (in order to sell perfume) to the detriment of
\nclothes made to be worn.” <\/p>\n
\nAnd where are the consumers in all this? Lidewij Edelkoort has the
\nfeeling that the younger generations will no longer feel the need to
\nown a whole expanding wardrobe of their own. She gives the example of
\nyoung Chinese clients who cannot afford to buy the dream item such as
\nthe Little Black Dress and opt without hesitation to buy one between
\nthem. And extolling the virtues of projects that in themselves are
\nslightly insane, such as the ‘habibliothèque’ in Paris that offers the
\npossibility (while at the same time fighting against fast fashion) of
\nhiring designer labels at an affordable price. <\/p>\n
\nConclusion: “Clothes will be the answer to the unsettling of the
\nfashion system. Analysing and conceptualising a trend will only be of
\ninterest if undertaken from an anthropological and humanist point of
\nview, and if we go back to the basics of ‘couture’ with its genuine
\ninterest in the fabric and the ‘way’ that we examined them before the
\ninvention of prêt-à-porter clothing. This is why my presentation this
\nevening, and those to come, will no longer talk about fashion – a
\nconcept that no longer has a raison d’être in this day and age.<\/p>\n
Original by Hervé Dewintre, FashionUnited’s correspondent in Paris. <\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Famous Dutch trend ‘forecaster’ Lidewij Edelkoort has clearly dealt with the matter that had been gnawing away at her for some time, resulting in a good dressing down for everyone – schools, the press, the catwalks, in short the whole fashion system. This has led to the creation of the manifesto, baptised ‘Anti-fashion,’ a pithy…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2109","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2109","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2109"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2109\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2109"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2109"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2109"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}