Results tagged “fashion” from Uncivil Society
Counterfeit Chic on the The Innovative Design Protection & Piracy Prevention Act--IDPPPA--the new fashion copyright bill just introduced in the U.S. Senate. Obtaining intellectual property protection has been a crucial issue for emerging designers in the U.S.--where the lack of copyright for clothing means that fashion has less IP protection than in Europe & Asia.
My last post featured a BBC satire of charitable fundraisers typified by a calculus of moral nihilism. Here's an upcoming event that's far more thoughtful: the Disabled and Sexy fashion show for the UK's Jennifer Trust for Spinal Muscular Dystrophy.
Unlike the ersatz porn stars of the Ladies Guild of Kneesley, this Notting Hill event isn't just about doing anything for cash. The fashion show reflects how the charity does more than treat a disease, an effort that itself can make people feel as if they've been reduced to a set of symptoms. Rather, the initiative celebrates the participants' full humanity, an aim that is as meaningful as providing medical care.
The Gap is sponsoring American Woman: Fashioning an American Identity, the latest exhibit at the Met's Costume Institute. The fact that the Gap did not insist on putting its own clothes on display was actually pretty savvy--while physically inserting Gap clothes into a fashion retrospective could call attention to the sponsorship and the gap between The Gap and high fashion, the sponsorship itself reinforces the sense of The Gap as the fashion identity of today, democratic, accessible and at the same time validated by an elite institution warehousing the style of the past.
Via WWD:
Hermès is reissuing a special version of its “Perspective” silk-twill scarf to support the International Federation of Human Rights on the 30th anniversary of the United Nations Convention for the rights of women. Priced at 215 euros, or $305.40 at current exchange, the scarf will be sold exclusively on the federation’s Web site, fidh.org, early next month. The original copy of the scarf has been signed by actress and singer Jane Birkin, who is also an ambassador for the organization. It will be exhibited from Nov. 1 in the Paris bookshop of French auction house Artcurial and sold through silent auction on Nov. 6. All proceeds from this sale will be donated to the federation.
Iranians have reportedly starting protesting the Ahmadinejad regime by going to bazaars and not shopping.
However, that doesn't mean the rest of the revolution is noncommercial.
One popular item: t-shirts featuring Neda Agha-Soltan, the Iranian woman whose murder by Iranian security forces, caught on this YouTube video (more about which here), has made her an icon of the protest movement.
Pictured above: a Neda t-shirt sold on Facebook by an Iranian who pledges to give the proceeds to Neda's family if 400 shirts are sold, though judging from the comments not everyone is on board with this enterprise:
The CafePress blog has also noted Neda tee phenomenon, highlighting a link between commerce and political speech:
While the Iranian government prohibits Neda’s family and friends from having memorials in her honor and tries to locally silence the voices mourning her, the world is talking. And from our end, a T-shirt is worth 1,000 words.
In other words, let a thousand Neda t-shirts bloom!
And yes, the last one really is a "Remembering Neda (Iran) Dog T-Shirt." The photo proclaims "Made in the USA", and y'know, I don't doubt it.
UPDATE:
Here's the PrestijFashion shirt mentioned in the comments!
An Iranian woman in Austin, Texas embodies the role of communications media in mobilizing protests against the hijacked election.
Via the ever-enlightening Hijab Style, here's a fascinating account of Kath Fry's journey from the Australian surf scene & Catholicism to becoming an Islamic convert & fashion designer.
Ms Fry met her business partner Eisha Saleh, 32, of Chester Hill, when she was studying Islam during her conversion from Catholicism three years ago. She discovered her new faith while working as a garment technician at the clothing chain David Lawrence.
"I had been working in the fashion industry for seven years and I was thinking, 'What is this life about?' " said Ms Fry, who now lives in Roselands.
"I went on a real spiritual journey. I found [Islam] very intriguing. I grew up a little surfer girl, always at the beach. I did not know Islam existed."
But when she looked for clothes to suit her new lifestyle, she was frustrated. So last year the friends created their own women's fashion line Baraka, Arabic for "blessing".
In keeping with its spiritual design philosophy, Baraka also has a distinct social ethic:
We as women, were also concerned for other women around the world suffering hunger, oppression and limited opportunities. baraka was created ultimately to help these women achieve independence and sustainability. This is how ‘Project Women was born.
The project’s philosophy is to help all women of the world with no discrimination on race, religion or colour. This unique concept is to involve women from around the world to participate in the making of the baraka label, earn a living and start to make lasting changes to their communities.
Aspiring business owners got a high-profile boost Thursday as designer Tory Burch and Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa unveiled the Tory Burch Foundation at Burch’s store on Robertson Boulevard. The foundation will support small businesses by making loans to aspiring entrepreneurs who don’t qualify for bank credit and is being launched in partnership with Accion, the largest micro lender in the United States. Burch gave an unspecified sum of money to the nonprofit to get things started, and said she’ll fund her namesake foundation through corporate partnerships and sales of goods such as tote bags and T-shirts.
My Esteemed Colleague Susan Scafidi writes on Supreme Court fashion for The Huffington Post.
Around three hundred years ago the Trexlers came to New York from Germany, but after getting a raw deal from the Brits we were lured to arable land in the area now known--in a vast historical injustice--as Mertztown, Pennsylvania. We immediately got to work establishing the foundational institutions of Western civilization--farms, roads, a burgeoning village and, of course, a shoe store! Check out my hometown's hottest designer label below:
Karl Lagerfeld was standing on the corner outside my apartment just a few minutes ago; no doubt he was looking to strike a deal.
Besides sponsoring one of New York's leading annual charitable fundraisers, Vogue has had a number interesting references to charity & green fashion as of late. This one in June I still haven't figured out--yes, Veruschka was famous for wearing body paint, but for charity?
Yet you can't really call someone the Baby when she [Natalia Vodianova] has been successfully busy hitting up billionaire oligarchs for sizable donations to her Naked Heart Foundation. The charity builds children's play parks in Russia (23 in nineteen cities since its inception in 2005). Yes, yes—MODEL GOES PHILANTHROPIC hasn't been news since Veruschka was covered in psychedelic body paint back in the sixties, but Vodianova is deeply passionate about the cause.
Museums have come to see fashion and pop culture as effective means for generating financial support. One upcoming case in point: the Minnesota History Center's RetroRama runway show, Fashion Comes Full Circle, featuring the work of local designers inspired by designs from the 1920s through '60s. The event also features shopping at a vintage boutique.
RetroRama, www.mnhs.org/retrorama, is an event hosted by the Minnesota Historical Society to celebrate the popular culture of the twentieth century and illustrate how the past has influenced the present. Featuring fashion, décor, music, dancing and related activities, RetroRama transports young and old back to a time when the Barbie was born and American Bandstand was all the rage. RetroRama also offers attendees the chance to experience popular games and crafts. From pop-up books to placemats, the do-it-yourself craft stations allow event-goers to take home a piece of retro style.
A reflection by Jonathan Bland.
Kenneth Cole's AWEARNESS blog--"raising awareness" as an extension of corporate identity marketing.
A UK charity has sparked a religious war with a comic strip aimed at promoting tolerance. The latest issue of Who Cares? Trust magazine Klic! features Standing Up For What You Believe In, in which a cross-wearing Christian bullies a Muslim girl for wearing a hijab. The key scene (image above):
In a cartoon strip, a boy wearing a large cross around his neck is shown telling a friend that a smiling Muslim girl in a veil looks like a terrorist.
He later confronts her and shouts: "Hey, whatever your name is, what are you hiding under your turban?"
She replies that the garment is called a hijab and that it is part of her religion "like the cross you wear".
The girl is then shown standing up for another boy, who is being bullied, and her behaviour is contrasted with that of the boy wearing the cross.
Some Christians are in an uproar over being stereotyped as bigots, and the fact that the charity receives a substantial amount of funding from the government is only stoking the fire.
The charity's intriguing response: the cross is not a reference to Christians.
Who Cares? Trust chief executive Natasha Finlayson described the cross as "bling" rather than a religious symbol.
Via Robot 6
Via Gothamist & Kinetic Carnival, video of a 1905 school outing to Coney Island. So much of interest here--the fashion, the barrel roll, the mechanical horse ride and, of course, the "charabang."
This is a rather busy work week for me--you should see the results of it soon--so posting will probably be light. Still, given what I've been studying re Grameen Check, I couldn't resist posting news of another fashion-related social venture that I noticed while walking home today: DR2's readings of Love, Loss and What I Wore.
$50 bucks a pop, but for a good cause. Perhaps the fashion-and-celebrity connection is a way to patch around the deep discounting that other arts groups feel they have to use now to attract an audience.
This is one of the coolest charity auctions I've seen--Russian Vogue is celebrating its 10th anniversary by auctioning off matrioshka dolls created by famous fashion designers. The beneficiary: Northern Crown, which provides care to orphaned children.
henry chavarria,babyboy,dollarsandsense,hip hop,art,cute,sex symbol,fashion,designer,thug life,money,clothing,, originally uploaded by babyboy_designs.
Ludacris as curator of his own hip-hop museum:
But then came "I Do It for Hip Hop," a self-consciously lo-fi celebration of precapitalist creativity that on Ludacris's new album, features his fellow millionaires Jay-Z and Nas.
"I don't do it for the money/I do it from the heart," Ludacris rapped. "The van Gogh flow/Luda do it 'cause it's art."
Then, quite unexpectedly, all those faux-naïf rhymes came true. A cavalcade of guests emerged to take the stage for a few moments each, a showcase of New York hip-hop history with a devoted fan as curator. It turned this show on its ear.
L L Cool J's "Rock the Bells" was invigorating, and Jadakiss's "We Gon Make It" sounded like rolling thunder. When Jim Jones and Juelz Santana emerged to perform "Pop Champagne," the flamboyant hip-hop anthem of the moment, Ludacris felt comfortable enough to put art back aside for a second: "I made the Forbes list, yeah, I know you seen it/Eight figures so if I say it, you know I mean it."
For more about Dollars & Scholars, check out BabyBoy's Myspace.
Protesting the fur industry during Russian winter is a losing proposition. Stripping in the cold never fails to get attention, but if these activists really want to make a difference, they might want to spend their time developing synthetic materials that could provide the same amount of warmth for a lower price--in Russia, where fur coats are primarily functional as opposed to a status good, fur is a relatively cheap way to keep from freezing.
Also not helping the cause--the fact that these women are foreigners from the U.S. and Australia. Russians have had their fill of clueless Westerners telling them what to do.
