i-D Magazine
The world we live in today is wrought with controversy and drastic changes due to our ever-evolving lifestyle. The Internet and social media have had a revolutionary impact on the way we interact, socialize, and even think about the world around us. Even though this technologically induced society we live in is thriving with a plethora of knowledge, society has become even more self-centered. The Speak Up Issue of i-D strives to bring awareness to social, ethical, political, and caring causes. This publication was created as a project for a Current Trends and Forecasting class at the Savannah College of Art and Design. This is a recreation of a i-D magazine and is not an official i-D publication.
The world we live in today is wrought with controversy and drastic changes due to our ever-evolving lifestyle. The Internet and social media have had a revolutionary impact on the way we interact, socialize, and even think about the world around us. Even though this technologically induced society we live in is thriving with a plethora of knowledge, society has become even more self-centered. The Speak Up Issue of i-D strives to bring awareness to social, ethical, political, and caring causes. This publication was created as a project for a Current Trends and Forecasting class at the Savannah College of Art and Design. This is a recreation of a i-D magazine and is not an official i-D publication.
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don’t mention the<br />
garment workers<br />
London-Friday September 12, 2014 began with the dropping<br />
of a vast banner reaching 30m on Waterloo Bridge, exposing,<br />
“Don’t Mention The Garment Workers.” As www.waronwant.<br />
com defined as,<br />
‘Activists are highlighting an event which, they<br />
say, promotes the creativity of the UK’s fashion<br />
industry, but is silent over the millions of workers<br />
who produce clothes for high street chains, often<br />
working long hours on poverty pay in unsafe<br />
conditions.’<br />
While Chanel’s closing attempt at a protest highlighted<br />
many issues in our culture right now (one of the<br />
main being feminism and women’s rights), fashion has<br />
had a long history with activism. Clothing has played<br />
a huge role in movements like women’s liberation and<br />
the anti-war efforts in the 60s and 70s, and continues<br />
to be important to brands like Vivienne Westwood and<br />
House of Riot. On the other hand, fashion has, until<br />
the past decade, been an industry relatively free from<br />
activist criticism. However, as this year’s London “Don’t<br />
Mention the Garment Workers” protest proves, it has<br />
been spotlighted as an industry full of corruption itself.<br />
This season, we saw the adoption of fashion activism<br />
commercially with Chanel’s end-of-show protest march.<br />
Because Chanel seems to always predict and describe<br />
the zeitgeist, we can expect a huge commercial explosion<br />
of fashion activism. The trick here is to adopt activism<br />
through other trends, such as logomania and prints,<br />
and to tread lightly as merchants, because activism can<br />
be a very polarizing issue. Customers, however, are<br />
starting to expect a message from their clothing, whether<br />
it is empowering, eco-friendly, political, or statement<br />
making. Consumers today seek an emotional bond with<br />
their clothing, rather than just an aesthetic one, and one<br />
of the best ways to connect a customer to a product is<br />
through shared ideas and statements.<br />
So next time you want to take part in activism, ask yourself<br />
if you’re going to wear it or act on it?<br />
TEXT RACHEL SCAFFE<br />
118 i-D THE SPEAK UP ISSUE
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